Little White Lies
by Laetus Fabricor
Summary: Did you know that in 2002, an experiment proved that adults on average lie at least once every ten minutes per conversation. The adults Harry had met far exceeded that average. Maybe he was just unlucky? Watch as he lives and attempts to avoid liars... but then again, you can either have truth or happiness, never both. Squalo x Harry
1. The truth about lies

For what was meant to be a quaint area, Little Whinging was bustling with people who had made lies their careers; lies were the life's blood of the community. Harry knew liars and the lies they spewed. At an early age he began to figure out when people were lying (because everybody lied, it wasn't a matter of if, but of when). Twitches in their cheeks, widening of eyes, etc. It wasn't long before he learnt that the liars are the ones who give eye contact. It was only when he was older that he would realise that he probably came across as creepy with how he looked at people so much. Focusing too much on their faces and their speech pattern than what was actually being said.

But as a child he was grateful for being able to locate falsehoods and after that came discerning other emotions. Anger, contempt and disgust; all of them emotions he was exposed to throughout his life. A twitching hand meant he should avoid his uncle Vernon because he was angry. He knew to keep away from his aunt when her lip corners was tightened and only one side was raised; it was indicator of her contempt.

However… by the time he was nine, he came to a rather cynical world view. One can either have truth or happiness, never both. His acceptance of this was quite quick, completely understandable considering there was nothing to be happy about when he was growing up.

* * *

 **Hello all ^-^ so this story has been on my mind for like, forever now but I never had the courage but today I decided to go, 'Fuck it' and I binge wrote for hours and I'm posting everything I have. I need to do more spontaneous things because I question myself way too much. It's pretty bad...**

 **Anyway! Meltdown aside, pretty much all of this is written from third person but with a narrow focus on Harry because it just limits you and sorta makes you as paranoid as him.**

 **Enjoy!**


	2. 1st set of Lies

**Lie no. 1:**

Things started going wrong fairly quickly, the closer it got to his eleventh birthday. First it happened when the glass caging the boa constrictor disappeared (even though it was not the weirdest thing to happen in his life, it was the start to a series of odd events that would result in events that would haunt him for years to come). Then the letters came and it was on the first letters arrival, that Harry saw one particular emotion on the portly man's face. One he never expected.

Eyebrows raised and pulled together. Upper eyelids raised, lower ones tensed, lips stretched towards his ears. Fear.

People didn't just get scared for nothing. And he wasn't going to risk Vernon's wrath over a letter. For, as they say, a cornered animal (and his uncle is very much like an animal, thank you) is often the most dangerous. So Harry watched on with bitter acceptance as he tore the letter between fat fingers. Then more came.

Shooting out from every crack, every crevice, every hole in the house. And that isn't even including the owls that carried them. He could see that each letter addressed to him had his specific location (down to the very room) before they were cruelly snatched by his uncle.

It wasn't long before the paranoia set in.

* * *

 **Lie no. 2:**

First his uncle boarded the letter flap shut. Then he chuckled to himself as he burned letters in the fireplace. The next Sunday, Harry could barely keep himself from rolling his eyes at his uncles elation. All because there was no post on Sundays. He cried in joy, unaware of the birds that shoot across the street. Unaware of the birds that had nestled themselves all over the perimeter of the house.

Well... Until a letter flew out of the fire place and hit him in the face that is. It only got worse from there. A storm of them shot of seconds later, surrounding them in a whirlwind of paper. He stood for a moment in wonder, before grabbing one and running. His uncle hot on his heels. He didn't make it to his 'room'. He was grabbed and held in place so he couldn't open the numerous letters in his reach.

"We're going away! Far away! So far, they won't be able to find us!" the man ranted, going pink in the face.

"Daddy's gone mad!" Dudley exclaimed (Harry couldn't help but pause in his struggling for a moment to think 'How long did it take you to figure that out?').

Somehow, the paranoia got worse.

* * *

 **Lie no. 3:**

He dragged the entire family to an island shack in the arse end of nowhere. Thunder crashing and lightning streaked across the night sky. Waves crashed against the shore. Everyone but Harry got a bed (as expected). And it was cold as shit.

When Dudley's watch went off at midnight, a large bang resounded through the shack and the light burst through the cracks. His cousin shot up and fell out of bed, as his aunt and uncle ran down the stairs. 'Is that shotgun? Where did he even get one of those?' he thought to himself in disbelief.

He turned as another thud resounded. The door had fallen from its hinges and lay on the floor with a mountain-sized man stepped inside, tucking a laughably small umbrella into his coat. "Sorry about that." he said as he walked into the building. Harry and the Dursley's watched in silent shock as he lifted the door back into place before turning towards Vernon and bending the end shotgun (which was definitely funny, thank you very much), completely disregarding all of the shorter man's rants whilst insulting him.

Harry stared on silently as the unknown man turned to Dudley and tried to instigate conversation. 'How does he know me?' he thought 'Although he doesn't know me as well as he thinks.'  
"I'm not Harry," Dudley clarified

"I am," he said from behind the titan.

The giant tried to explain that he had a gift (which was sadly Harry's first), but he had sat on it.

"I imagine it'll taste fine just the same," he tried to placate, passing a cake over. "Who are you?" he asked, his curiosity finally being too strong to hold in.

"Rubeus Hagrid, Keeper of Keys and Grounds at Hogwarts." he explained.

* * *

 **Lie no. 4:**

So… magic is a thing?

Fact: Harry had many things happen in his life.

Fact: A majority of those things could be explained by magic

Fact: Hagrid wasn't lying

Fact: Goblins are his kind of people.

Gringotts was alive with energy as people as he stood at the front desk with a goblin staring down at him with beady little eyes. The two stared at each other for a good minute before Hagrid took over the conversation and proceeded to drag him through the bank.

What really sold him on the goblins was their warning:

 _Enter, stranger, but take heed_  
 _Of what awaits the sin of greed_  
 _For those who take, but do not earn,_  
 _Must pay most dearly in their turn._  
 _So if you seek beneath our floors_  
 _A treasure that was never yours,_  
 _Thief, you have been warned, beware_  
 _Of finding more than treasure there._

Long, deflective and still appropriately threatening.

* * *

 **Lie no. 5:**

Wizards are dumb. Considering how adamant they are about hiding magic from muggles, they aren't very inconspicuous. First Hagrid had left him in the middle of King's Cross Station, then sent him to find an arbitrary platform with a super weird name. And can he just complain about the super loud family who weren't even trying to hide the fact that they were running straight into a wall! It wasnt even one or two, but a whole brood!

It physically hurt Harry to watch them.

He nodded blankly as he listened to the woman's instructions.

The train was tolerable thankfully considering he was able to hide in a small compartment away from everyone in the middle of the train. He was half asleep when one of the gingers sneaked in and asked if he could sit down with him.

'Hand in pocket, half hidden behind door, trying to hide himself, no confidence in what he's saying. Liar' he thought

"Sorry, there are other people here as well, they all just went to the toilet," he lied, turning away "Sorry." then the boy left in a huff. And when he finally thought he would finally have some peace a girl burst in uniform and asked about a toad. The only upside to all of this was a pair of fixed glasses.


	3. 2nd set of Lies

**Lie no. 6:**

An inconspicuous time in the school was all he wanted. So he hid in plain sight. He joined Gryffindor, avoided the manipulative headmaster. Did as was expected. Saved the school from a homicidal professor in his first year, a psychotic ghost and basilisk in his second year and met his godfather in his third year. He did as was expected, but he tried to avoid the weasleys and the granger girl as much as possible. Dumbledore had his claws deep within them. At least he could get along with Sirius. But he couldn't always avoid them.

Quidditch was their sport, even if he did love flying. So when he went off to the world cup with the Weasleys he already had a bad feeling in his stomach, Then the death eaters came and explosions filled the air. Cackling and crackling. Bursts of light and screaming. Fire and fear. Then the eerie symbol of the dark mark filled the air.

* * *

 **Lie no. 7:**

Harry already had an exit plan in place. He and Sirius had letters passed through Gringotts (Thank Merlin those goblins liked him) to the Italian ministry. Turns out they did not like the british ministry and were more than willing to give Harry and Sirius as a way to stick it to Fudge. Especially considering the fact that Sirius was never formally put on trial, but was rather thrown in jail to rot.

So when he was dragged before the other headmasters and the three champions and was told he had to participate in the tournament, he merely smiled casually and said "Liar."

"Excuse me?!" Bartemius Crouch Sr roared.  
"Well, you had one hand in your pocket and were shifted away, meaning you don't believe a single word you're saying. And you ends of your lips twitched a bit so you're the slightest bit happy that everyone believed you, it's called a masking smile," Harry explained  
"That means nothing!"  
"Sure, individually they mean nothing. But all of them together added with the context of the situation, they generally mean deception." he told the adults and the other champions.

Having had enough with the stupidity of adults, he watched as the champions all gained small smiles, attempting to hide them behind false neutral faces. He grinned at them before pulling out the tournament going on to say "Plus, the rulebook says that any champion chosen has twenty four hours to back out, and by my count it only been about ten minutes since I was picked,"

Flipping to a marked page in the rulebook, he passed it to the headmasters before taking out another letter and giving it to Dumbledore. "This is my notice of withdrawal, by the way,"  
"Withdrawal?"  
"Yep, I'm moving to Italy! Mostly because this place is crap, but there are other reasons," he grinned "You are one of them," at the second statement, the champions snickered at his casual admission.  
"Watch your language!"

* * *

 **Lie no. 8:**

Italy was nice. It was warm and the streets were always alive. A lot better than England. He went to a tuition center for his magic and went to school for muggle subjects. He did well in the Liceo delle scienze umane or the Lyceum for human sciences. He did well all things considered but he wasn't the best by far. He wanted to go into behavioural sciences, possibly psychology for uni, maybe other degrees at a later date? It wasn't like he couldn't afford it.

Unlocking the door to the flat he shared with Sirius, he stepped inside and toed off his shoes when he felt his phone vibrate. He had gotten new glasses with an accurate prescription, so he could actually see well and a phone to keep in contact with Sirius when he ran off to look around the city they now lived in. But still...That doesn't give him the right to send him forty messages per hour!

"Sirius…" he seethed, shuffling into the living room where his godfather sat calmly with instant noodles and the tv playing a soap opera in italian. Pausing he stared at the large screen then back at his godfather "Sirius? What the hell? The ministry officials haven't come by to set up the translation charm, how are you even watching this?" he asked, tilting his to the side.  
"English subtitles,"  
"Where are they then?" he inquired, looking at the tv were a female actress was speaking in a fast pace with no subtitles in sight. "They come and go," Sirius explained  
"And you haven't stopped watching it?"  
"I make up my own lines when I don't have them. Good to see your safe by the way!"

Sighing, Harry turned and walked into the open kitchen. Dropping the rucksack he had been carrying for hours to the floor, he went off to the fridge. Suddenly Sirius' voice filled the apartment as he cried "No Antonio! Don't leave her!"

It was at that point that Harry knew, perpetual sighing was going to be a daily thing.

* * *

 **Lie no. 9:**

Five years of hard work, exhaustion, and the occasional breakdown, finally paid off. He had did it. He had graduated from upper secondary school. With a diploma and good references for university. HE had decided on psychology for university.

So a month after his graduation, he and Sirius sat in their (still sparsely decorated) living room. Their eyes stayed on the letter from the University of Padova before them sitting on the coffee table."We should open it," Sirius said  
"We should."  
"Are you going to?"  
"Nope…"

Suddenly he jumped to his feet and grabbed the envelope. "I gotta know!" he repeated over and over like it was a mantra, ripping it open. Staring at the letter he skimmed over it. "Dear Mr Black... blah blah blah… … … Congratulations you been accepted to the university of Padova!" he exclaimed.

* * *

 **Lie no. 10**

University was glorious. No one knew his name. They probably all thought of him as that one guy that never talks at the back of professor Saava's lecture hall. He spent hours on essays and coursework and spent every second loving it. He got on well with his professors and advisors and kept his head down. He moved into the dorms but he spent most weekends with Sirius at home. Weirdly enough, watching soap operas in foreign languages had become their saturday routine since they had moved to Italy five years ago. Even when he was older, he would be grateful for the amount of freedom Sirius had given him over the years.

He slowly made friends with the girl that lived in the dorm across with from him, Clara. She was always smiling and any time outside of studying was spent gaming. She was his second true friend despite the tentative bond that the youngest weasley and the granger girl tried to enforce. She didn't patronise him for the whole, 'I'm gonna spend every second staring at your facial features and focus on every little twitch to see if you're lying through your teeth'.

His first friend was Luna Lovegood, he wondered how she was doing. He still wished that she had been able to come with he and Sirius when he had asked, but she had refused sadly. He got the occasional letter from her informing her of her health every since she and her father left magical Britain but that was it.

* * *

 **Lie no 11:**

Nearly three years went by in a blur in lectures and exams. Before he knew it, he was preparing for his dissertation. He was running around the university looking for various volunteers in an attempt to prove his theory on the universality of emotion. At least a hundred and twenty volunteers (hopefully from different countries and cultures), maybe someone to help, and he had to get the ethics committee for his experiment and then he had to type it up! There was no time for anything!

When he got the approval from Ethics, Clara was nice enough to send his name, email and the basis of his experiment to some of the volunteers for her dissertation. Thankfully most had replied and were willing to take part in it. Hours went by getting them to sign forms and even more hours spent bent over his laptop typing furiously half asleep and his 100% of his blood had been replaced by red bull, which was nice. The not so nice part was the anxiety and stress.

* * *

 **Lie no. 12:**

By this point he was twenty two and bored. His hair had grown to his chin and had leveled out, so it wasn't as a bird's nest. He spent most of the time trying to move it out of his face (which Sirius laughed at profusely). He was thinking about moving out, and Sirius said he was fine with that. Maybe he could work in a bar? Bartending sounded fun, and it wasn't like he was doing the job for the money.

Both Harry and Clara had graduated from Padova with their degrees and Clara was planning to go back to Sweden to live with her family. They were definitely going to stay in touch through Skype and the like, sending texts back and forth, thank god for the lack of time difference between Sweden and Italy. And at this point he had taken his OWLs and NEWTs in the Italian ministry and had done well enough.

It was his first day since moving his things back in after graduation and Clara had come along. He, Clara and Sirius were watching a turkish soap opera with their subtitles off. Warm mugs of hot chocolate were in their hands as they sat with their feet on the aging coffee table. Clara had taken it upon herself to record it on her phone so she could watch it and laugh when she was stressed.

This was the life

* * *

 **Moreover, some of you may wonder why he's not affected by the war in these chapters but he sort of is, it just becomes more obvious later. But, you have to remember he just left the war early, so he wasn't exposed to things like the tournament or Umbridge. Also Squalo shows up in the next chapter and I would like to mention that this is two years prior to canon, so Xanxus is still on ice and Tsuna is still an oblivious little bean. I'd also like to mention Squalo is 2 years older than canon. So instead of being 20 at this stage, he is 22 (the same age as Harry).**

 **Hope you enjoyed**


	4. 3rd Set of Lies

**Lie no. 13:**

So bartending is fun! He had so many odd regulars!

Ok, so maybe he should elaborate.

After the new year, Harry told Sirius he was definitely moving out. To which Sirius said that the Black family had a home in the countryside that was never used and that Harry should stay in their apartment; Sirius would move to the Black home. He didn't want Harry to lose their memories at the home, which was incredibly kind of him.

Skip another month and he had found a job bartending in Palermo (which was apparently Vongola Famiglia territory). It was nice place. Didn't have much work in the middle of the day, as expected; but when it got late, people (who were all obviously mafiosi -obviated by their guns and the way they carried themselves-) made their way in as if they were a tide coming into shore. There were a few altercations in the bar, which -yet again- was completely expected with the amount of alcohol consumed.

But, all things considered, it was great.

* * *

 **Lie no. 14:**

It was early on a Saturday morning when he stormed in, about two hours before closing. Any patrons who were still there avoided him as he sat himself down at the bar. He had long silver hair and there was just… something about him. Maybe it was the way he hid his sadness behind a facade of unbridled rage, like the way Harry hid his cynicism behind jokes and easy going smiles.

Harry placed the glass he had been cleaning down gently and made his way over. An ambiguous smile was on his face as he asked: "What would you like?" A myriad of emotions flickered over his face before he settled on a neutral mask and asked for a beer. Serving it up, Harry easily went back to drying glasses in silence.

The man looked up for a moment or two, watching his moving. He opened his mouth, as if he was about to say something, before closing it a beat later.

* * *

 **Lie no. 15:**

Since then, the man would show up every Saturday morning. This continued on for about a month before he finally said something to Harry. "Voi," the man began "What's your name?"

"Harry." he replied, not saying a word afterwards.

"Not gonna ask me mine?"

"Do you really want me to ask?" he inquired, looking up at him before returning to cleaning the bar with an old rag.

"My name is Squalo."

* * *

 **Lie no. 16:**

He wasn't sure when, but Squalo had made himself a normality within Harry's life. He'd spend most of the daylight hours in bed sleeping, maybe even at Sirius' new home watching their soap operas. Most nights were spent at the bar, joking around with patrons; giving some an easy smile and compliments in hopes for a tip or more orders.

But Saturday mornings were different. Squalo would waltz in, take a seat in front of him and spend the entire time brooding and would stay until closing. Sometimes Harry would even join him for a drink if he got depressing enough. The man was obviously a high ranking mafiosi with the way other ones avoided him like the plague, ergo he was incredibly dangerous. Yet… all Harry saw was a very sad man.

* * *

 **Lie no. 17:**

"You don't say much do you?"

"It would be a waste of energy."

"Why do you say that?"

"Didn't you know? Words are the catalyst for lies."

"What?"

"The truth is subjective to the viewer, therefore it can be interpreted as a lie depending on the view of anyone else. Opinions and bias cause events that are true, to be twisted into lies simply because of the purpose of their speech, the emotions of the speaker and the time they speak, which can have catastrophic results. What's the point in talking when, inevitably, it's all a lie."

* * *

 **Lie no. 19:**

Harry started getting worried when Squalo didn't show up one Saturday about three months after they met. He started freaking out when he missed two Saturdays in a row. By the third, he was nearly pulling his hair out when Squalo walked in just before closing, his hunched form walking over with tears in his clothes and the occasional bruise.

He jumped over the bar (thankful that there was no one else in the bar) and helped his friend(?) To a seat, despite loud protests. Pulling out a beer from behind the counter, he uncapped it with his teeth and passed it over to the injured man.

"Aren't you going to ask me what happened?" Squalo asked before taking a gulp of alcohol

"No. Despite how little I know about you, I know you will tell me if you want to."

"And you aren't going to ask me where I've been?"

"Again, if you could or wanted to tell me, you would. I will wait for that moment."

They sat in silence for a little while, as Squalo kept drinking; Harry watched as he got drunker and drunker. "Voi, pass me your phone," he ordered. Passing it over, he watched as injured man typed in a number and called it. A default ringtone went off from a phone I'm his pocket and he cancelled the call. "Call me on Saturdays if I'm not here by closing," he told Harry "You're not intolerable."

* * *

 **Lie no. 20: -six months later-**

A dial tone. Ringing.

" _Hello?"_

" _So you finally decided to call me?"_

" _Firstly, it's been my only opportunity to use it since you gave me this number; and secondly I thought I would wait until closing to make sure."_

" _Whatever…_

" _so why do you stare at people?"_

" _That's what you want to know?"_

" _It's the only thing that interests me,"_

" _That hurts. I thought I was more interesting. Anyway, to answer your questions, when people try to lie they have micro-expressions on their faces. It's a brief flicker of their true emotion that they can't hide. It helps me know when people are lying."_

" _So you're like a human polygraph test?"_

" _Ugh. Don't even get me started on those. If you want I can send you my dissertation for university?"_

" _Sure."_

A moment of silence between callers.

" _Voi, I gotta go. I should be back for next Saturday,"_

" _See you then."_

* * *

 **Lie no. 21:**

Squalo was indeed back for the following Saturday morning. By the time he got there, everyone had already left and Harry was just cleaning up. He sat down before him and Harry took out a beer for them. Uncapping his drink, he leaned into the wooden bar. He let out a placid sigh as he took a swig and looked at his seated friend blankly.

"You never did tell me why you hate polygraphs?" the silver haired man asked, a grin on his face as he watched Harry's smile twitch with barely concealed contempt. "The thing about polygraphs is that they react to the change in heartbeat. And sure that has its ups and downs. But what people don't take into account is the fact that your heartbeat doesn't only change when you lie, it also changed when you go through intense emotion! I mean honestly! Ask a person baseline questions and then have a person they would be attracted to ask the same questions after and the subject would fail everytime! And it's due to simple arou-" he ranted before coming to a stop once he saw the amused expression on Squalo's face.

"I should charge you double for that."

* * *

 **Lie no. 22:**

He wasn't sure when he got home. Everything was a blurry mess. He couldn't remember anything after threatening to charge Squalo double and drinking some more. Rubbing his hands over his face, he couldn't help but think 'at least I remembered to take my glasses off'. A buzz went off on his phone that was to the side.

Feeling around for his glasses, he put them on after finding them and stared at his phone for a few seconds. '7:00am' it read, which meant he had forgotten a good five hours. 'How much did I drink?' he asked himself, beginning to panic a bit until he felt movement beside him and an arm went over his waist. Looking over his shoulder he saw a shirtless Squalo looking at him through bleary eyes, who went on to say "Turn that light off and go back to sleep."

Shooting up the bed and into a seated position, he looked under the covers and said "I'm naked."

"Yup."

"And so are you,"

"Absolutely,"

"What happened last night?"

* * *

 **Lie no. 23:**

Somehow 'early Saturday mornings at the bar with Squalo' became 'early Saturday mornings at the bar with Squalo and late Saturday mornings in bed with Squalo'. Yet he couldn't really find it in himself to be _that_ bothered. The two had known each other for about a year, by this point. Sure, he had no idea what Squalo worked as (even if he had some guesses), and sure, he only really learnt his last name recently (but then again, Harry had only given it recently as well so technically they were even) and sure, sometimes Squalo would look at him and Harry may or may not have the sudden urge to tell Squalo _everything_.

But that didn't mean he had a problem. Oh, who was he kidding, he definitely had a problem.

* * *

 **Truth no. 1:**

Harry Black (previously Potter, prior to his migration to Italy) was in love with Squalo Superbi.

* * *

 **So yeah! Harry's relationship isn't conventional by any means. The two are just guys with shitty lives trying to avoid them in their own ways. Their relationship is somewhat convoluted, like them, and they don't go about it in normal ways. Squalo doesn't because he's devoted to the Varia and because he's too proud, whereas Harry is too cynical. At the end of this, Harry and Squalo are now twenty three, because they have 'known each other for a year' by this point.**


	5. 4th Set of Lies

**Lie no. 24:**

It was about nine in the morning on a Saturday when he came to the realisation that Harry was in love with Squalo. His head was lying on the Italian's chest as they lay together in Squalo's bed. Possibly the first time the two had ended up in it (usually they go to Harry's flat). Squalo's fingers were playing in his black hair, Harry wasn't fretting over lies and truths. Rather, he was focused on the warmth from the cocoon of duvets and blankets he had, somehow, made.

It was sickeningly domestic.

Maybe it was the way that he wasn't bothered about the face staring problem like Clara had been. Or it could have been the way that Squalo was actually interested in the dissertation that he had put his blood, sweat and tears into. It might have been the way that he casually teased Harry about polygraphs. Or the warm hugs and the way he wasn't bothered when Harry flinched (memories of Vernon's rage returning to the forefront of his mind). Or the way that when he didn't come into the bar on Saturday mornings, he would call and they would talk for hours on the phone about nonsense. Or maybe it was the unspoken fact that he most definitely cleaned out his Saturdays to spend time with Harry. Or the unabashed loudness that was his nature. Or the way his volume would lower when he was worried. Or how determined he was to be the best swordsman. Maybe it was all of these things. But harry was absolutely in love with Squalo.

"You ok?" Squalo asked, breaking the silence.

"...Yeah I'm fine."

It was the first time he lied to Squalo ( he hoped it would never happen again).

* * *

 **Lie no. 25:**

It was about a month later that their Saturday schedule would be broken for the second time. Squalo had shown up at his door bleeding for the first time (and sadly it wouldn't be the last).

Harry helped him to a seat in the open kitchen and pulled out a first aid kit from a cupboard. Putting on the gloves, he began to clean out one of the wounds in his left shoulder. "Will you tell me what happened?"

"Got into a little fight, I'm fine."

Harry paused for a moment before dabbing the alcohol swab over the wound again. "Squalo. I care for you. Deeply. And I know you can't tell me things about your job, I accepted that long ago. But do not insult my intelligence by telling me such things." he told him blandly; any emotion previously there, gone.

After sewing the cuts shut, he tied them with bandages and leaned back, going off to turn the kettle on for tea. Turning around to find the tea bags, he stopped when he saw Squalo standing over him. Harry let himself be pulled into a hug as Squalo lowered his volume (a rare thing outside of sex) and murmured: "Voi… I'm… _sorry_."

He was being honest.

* * *

 **Truth no. 2:**

That just made Harry fall in love with him more.

* * *

 **Lie no. 26:**

It was Halloween again when Harry told him. The anniversary of his parents death. What made it worse was that it was on a Saturday, so he was missing Squalo. He was sitting at home wallowing in guilt and alcohol, Sirius was doing the same at his home. Harry would have gone, but he didn't want to hear another conversation about why he was so much like his father.

A knock on his front door was what finally dragged him away from his couch and beer. Unlocking it, he saw Squalo leaning against the railing opposite with his arms crossed with anger on his face (he had given up trying to hide it once Harry had shown what he could do at the bar). "Voi! If you're not gonna show up, call me!" he yelled at him. Guilt crashed through Harry as he looked away. He heard a few steps being taken and then a hand on his cheek. "You ok?"

"Not really…" he told him. It was silent for a moment until Squalo sighed and took his hand, pulled him into the apartment and sat him down on the couch. He went about picking up all the empty bottles around the floor. "How much did you drink?"

"I don't know…"

When he finally set down, he curled Harry up into his side and for once the wizard felt safe. His hand in Squalo's and he held on as if it was a dream that he would wake up on and all of it would be a lie and he would wake up drunk and hungover.

"When I was about 1, on this day my parents murdered. I can't tell you everything, but they died and I was the only survivor. The idiots back in England thought I, the baby, had done something that killed their killer. They threw a huge party, because the killer was a terrorist and everyone had a great time. But it was the day I was shipped off to my aunt and uncle and… they were less than nice relatives. All because my godfather was more interested in avenging them rather than raising their child in their stead.

And then for three years straight, bad things happened on Halloween. Like it was just this huge karmic 'fuck you'. Like 'hey! You survived but we're gonna make your life hell in return! Have a nice day!', y'know? I talk to my godfather now, we lived with each other for a few years... but I can't help but not hate him just a little..."

He was pulled into a side hug and the two sat in silence for a while until Squalo said "I haven't talked to my boss in about seven years. Like you, I can't tell you everything. But this was a man that I had given everything to! We were on top of the world, and then things came crashing down. We were betrayed, he's been sorta arrested by his own father, I've been in charge in his place. And it's shit. Because my boss is like a brother to me."

"I think Karma hates us."

"Probably."

They sat in more silence until Harry said "You do realise I'm in love with you and, while I'm grateful you did this, it does not help me deal with it."

* * *

 **Lie no. 27:**

When Harry came to, it felt like someone was taking a sledgehammer to his head, everything that had happened in the morning (it was Saturday afternoon. At least his phone was charged, but who had put it in?) was a blur and he was in bed. "I need to stop drinking…' he told himself before getting out and shuffling out of his room.

He rubbed the sleep out of his eyes, he walked into the kitchen, where Squalo was sitting on a stool, and sat down. Laying his head on the cool table, he felt Squalo pat him on the back in sympathy (really? That's new…). "Hey Squalo… did I say anything weird last night?" he asked, his voice mumbled by the table.

"No."

Pitch raised higher than baseline, he paused in what he was doing. Lie.

He didn't say anything about it though.

* * *

 **Lie no. 28:**

Technically, the two had never had a date. Usually people go to restaurants for dates or concerts or bars (which would never count for the two of them because Harry worked in a bar) or whatever. And that was ok with them. Neither of them were romantics and Squalo was getting busier after Halloween hit for some reason (even though he would never fail to still call when he didn't show up).

Then it changed a bit. One Friday he was being taken to a museum, sure it was one of the rare times that Squalo wasn't in uniform, but it didn't feel like a date and their conversations were the same as usual. Although… he could feel a slight annoyance coming off of Squalo. "Are you ok?"

"My… coworker found out about us. She was… annoyed, to say the least, that we have never gone out on a date."

Harry smiled and slipped his hand into Squalo's. "Y'know, quite frankly I find dates overrated. I'd much rather be at home watching TV or something. As long as you're there I don't mind."

At that, Squalo came to a halt. He turned and stood directly before him. It was times like this that Harry realised how much taller than him Squalo truly was. It was in the middle of all this mental floundering when he felt something brush his lips. A few seconds later it was gone and Squalo was leaning away from him again.

"Let's go home."

* * *

 **Lie no. 29:**

After the date (that wasn't really a date), Harry kept randomly finding some of Squalo's clothes in his flat here and there. And then he started leaving some of his things into Squalo's apartment by accident. Before he knew it the two were finding entire drawers filled with their things in each others homes.

When Squalo asked him to keep a bag in his apartment he didn't hesitate to say 'ok'. It was heavy and looked like it was anything. When he asked, because he couldn't not ask (somehow Squalo had gotten used to Harry's on and off curiosity about things most people would not be curious about), the silver haired man said "It's an away bag. Has everything I need just in case I'm called into work while I'm here."

So, in response, he gave Squalo a key to his apartment.

He just didn't think he would use it the one time he decided to wear one of Squalo's sweaters. He had the sleeves rolled back and he was practically drowning in it. He was drinking his tea when he heard the front door open. Footsteps approached before stopping for a couple of seconds and continuing over. He felt arms go around his waist and lips on his neck.

"You got work?"  
"Yeah, but I can call in."  
"Good."

* * *

 **The thing about this pairing that i wasnt to express straight up, is that it isn't conventional, in terms of how they approach ther relationship. As said before, Squalo will probs never admit he's in love because he's proud and Harry has personal issues a mile long and to avoid dealing with them, he drinks. Not a lot, mind you Harry's not an alcoholic (If he was he wouldn't be a good bartender and this would be a lot darker with how I write things). Most of the time he drinks moderately, but sometimes he just gets blackout to avoid certain things as seen in the last set of lies and in this one in terms of the anniversary of his parents' death.**


	6. 5th Set of Lies

**Lie no. 30:**

A dial tone. Ringing.

"Hey! How are you?"  
"I could be better. I really don't want to be here."

"Oh?"  
"Work is being a pain. I called to tell you I won't be around for a month. I wanted to tell ."

Silence

"I'll be back after it's over, but I won't be able to call."  
"Ok…"  
"Voi! Stay safe…"  
"That's what I should be saying!"

"Ha! I'm gonna be fine. You free for a talk though?"

* * *

 **Lie no. 31:**

It was about a week after Squalo left. He was sitting in a public park with a little girl, Rosa, sitting next to him. She was a street kid he had known for a while. She was a miniature Harry. She could read expressions and frankly, he wanted to give her a chance in the world.

Plus she gave good advice.

"So he's gone?"  
"Only for another 3 weeks."

"Damn… You really like him."  
"Rosa." a stern voice, commanding tone.  
"Yep. you're head over heals."  
"Rosa" whining tone.

"Just tell him, god!"

"It's easier said than done."

"Look, Harry. If he leaves you for that, then he really doesn't deserve you. Aren't you the one who told me that it's either truth or happiness. And I dare you to try and tell me that you would be happy spending how long not even trying to hide it."

* * *

 **Lie no. 32:**

About a week later Harry and Rosa were sitting on their designated bench again. She was sitting casually with a ice lolly having the time of her life, meanwhile Harry was having a meltdown. He was pretty sure she was secretly amused by everything that was happening to him. The forced look of neutrality covered an expression of humour hidden on her face.

It was with bitter acceptance that he finally just stopped wallowing in fear and began teaching her more ways in how to read micro expressions.

* * *

 **Lie no. 33:**

It was a few days before Squalo was due to be back that Harry gave in the paperwork. Rosa was skipping down the street and telling him to hurry up as they walked to his (no, their) apartment. As of that day, Rosa was under his custody. Officially he was her foster father, but frankly she was more of a sister to him.

Unlocking the door, he pointed out her new room (Sirius' old one, it was pretty empty except for the necessities). "Hey Harry?"

"Yeah?"

"You're really cool."

* * *

 **Lie no. 34:**

Sirius loved her.

It was the day before Squalo was due back when he decided to introduce the small girl to his godfather. The older wizard told her to call him "Uncle" right away. His hopes were dashed when she said "How bout I call you gramps instead?"

Harry nearly died laughing at Sirius' face. It was glorious.

Somehow, Rosa and Sirius because fast frenemies. They either argued or teased each other. It would have been great! If Squalo wasn't mentioned.

He wasn't planning on telling Sirius about Squalo until a much later date. Y'know until Squalo either left him, because he wasn't looking for a steady relationship, or told him that he didn't mind (which was very unlikely). Cue the teasing from family.

* * *

 **Lie no. 35:**

He flipped through his keys at the end of the day at their door as Rosa chattered away about how phone and weird Sirius was. He couldn't help but smile about how easily they got along. As he unlocked the door.

Opening the door, he paused when he saw combat boots on the side and a duffle bag next to them.

He placed a hand over Rosa's mouth causing her to stop. He waited for a second until after a few seconds, Squalo walked out of the living room and into the corridor.

He stared at him for a couple of moments, then his eyes moved over to Rosa who stood casually behind him. Glaring unrepentantly.

"Voi, who's the kid?"

* * *

 **Lie no. 36:**

Rosa had run off into the kitchen whilst Squalo and Harry sat down in the living room. They were sitting together awkwardly and Harry was freaking out internally.

"So? A kid?" Squalo asked casually  
"Yeah, her name is Rosa. She's a pain but she's great."  
"She's your's?"

"She's my foster daughter, but to be honest we see each other as siblings more." he explained "She is really good with reading expressions. I wanna teach her what I can do. I want her to grow up and be… y'know… happy, because she's been good to me for the seventh months I've known her crazy arse self."

Squalo looked at him for a little while and sighed "Whatever."

* * *

 **Truth no. 3:**

It was about a week later and Squalo was probably at work, Rosa was asleep and Harry had just gotten home from work, when Harry called him. He had spent the morning listening to Rosa tell him that he needed to tell Squalo about the whole 'I'm in love with you" problem.

He tried to avoid it by letting her stay with Sirius for the afternoon (a complete deflection), which seemed to work. Then he went to the bar and spent the entire time trying to avoid hs problems by listening to other people's problems. Then he got home, remembered his problems and decided to avoid them via drinking.

Apparently, at some point at around three in the morning, he decided to call Squalo for some reason.

A dial tone. Then ringing followed.

"Hello?" a raspy voice greeted

"Everything has been super shitty since you've been gone!" his voice whined (something he would deeply regret later on)  
"Are you drunk?"

"I think about you way more than I should! And you're freaking amazing! The hugs are amazing, and you don't judge when sometimes I flinch even though it's just a hug! But I feel like I'm waiting for something that isn't going to happen! You're loud and determined and being with you just makes me smile so much!" he ranted

"Harry-" he began  
"I'm not done! Talking to you makes my day, Squalo. Truth is, I'm in love with you. Like seriously, head over heels, on cloud nine, in love with you. And everyone can see that, except you. I mean, I'm having Rosa and my godfather tease me about you. And no, I don't tell my godfather about you, Rosa is just a blabbermouth…" he slurred.

Then the doorbell rang. "Open the door." he said. He rolled off the sofa and shuffled over. Unlocking the door, Squalo stood there with an annoyed look on his face. He made his way inside and toed off his boots as he cancelled the call.

He turned Harry over and pushed him forward through the house and into bed. "Go to bed," he ordered.  
"Hey Squalo?" he started "I know you probably don't love me… but I just wanted to let you know because as I always say, 'truth or happiness, you can't have both'..."

* * *

 **People prompt me! I wrote so much that I'm running on empty fumes! (Don't worry Clara does come back and Luna will show up at the same time in the next set of lies or the one after that) Anyway! Harry got drunk again and he confessed... again! I think that will be an issue for Harry, like he knows he can't have both truth or happiness and tries to avoid the deciding conversation. However, on this occassion he does remember what happened and it will be discussed in the next set of lies.**

 **And I would like to apologise for the posting issue of previous chapters. I do preview them and I do try to see if it's fine, and when I'm like 'Yeah this is fine', I post it only to end up seeing it isn't. Trying to find out what is happening but it will take a while i think. Again, I apologise for any inconveniences. I reposted the entire fic, lets hope it works!**

 **Enjoy!**


	7. 6th Set of lies

**Lie no. 37:**

It was around nine in the morning when Rosa got out of her room and walked into the kitchen. Squalo was sitting on a barstool as he had a coke and she stared at him in silence for a little while. "I could hear big brother on the phone with you last night, how did you get here so fast? She asked, pulling bread out of the pantry.

"I was already on my way here." he grumbled, glaring at the child "How old are you?"

"Eleven."

"Hey Squalo," she began, dropping the bread into the toaster "I know you who you are. I mean I'm a street kid, I can't not know about you and the Var-"

"What of it?"

"What of it? I thought you were smarter than this" she hissed "You're sleeping with my brother, who is in love with you, and do you know how rare that is? I've known him for seven months and when people realise what he can do they just shuffle away awkwardly. There is always a chance you will reject him and he'll be heartbroken, which is hard enough to think about. But if anything happens to my brother because of your position, so help me, I will crush you. Varia or not."

Squalo stared at the girl for a few seconds before sighing. "The only reason I'm not yelling at you is because your brother is asleep and you're trying to protect family."

"Family means everything."

('Strong, active lightening' he thought 'Huh… Didn't expect that')

* * *

 **Lie no. 38:**

Later on, Harry walked in and stared at Rosa and Squalo as they glared at each other for each other from across the kitchen. He rubbed his temples as his sister passed him a bottle of water and painkillers. When he tossed the latter into his mouth, he ruffled her short hair. "Hey Squalo," he greeted before turning to the fridge. "Rosa, Sirius is coming to get you for the day in about…" he paused, looking at his phone "Two hours."

"Yay, do you think I could get him to teach me how to make backhand compliment?"  
"With his upbringing… Probably."

"Yes!" she cried, running off with a sandwich into her room to get changed.

"Sirius?" Squalo asked  
"My godfather. He's a bad influence." he explained pulling out some leftover pasta from the day before.

Harry sighed, and shuffled over before sitting down on the other side of the island table Squalo sat at. He looked at him for a little while. "We need to talk…"  
"Look-"  
"Please…" he mumbled, Squalo stayed silent before nodded after a while.  
"Ok, so I was drunk, but I remember. I'm in love with you. And it's highly unlikely you feel the same. And so you will probably leave me but that's fine."

* * *

 **Truth no. 4:**

"What do you love about me?"  
"You're loud and don't care. You don't judge me. And even when you can't tell me things, you tell me that, you never lie to me."  
"You do realise that just because I don't tell you doesn't mean I don't."  
"Tell me what?"  
"That I love you."

* * *

 **Lie no. 39:**

Somehow, everything was relatively the same afterwards. They _still_ slept together. They _still_ spent Saturdays together. Harry _still_ stole Squalo's shirts. They _still_ called when Squalo went off for work. Everything was calm. The one difference was the lack of awkwardness. Sure Squalo rarely (if ever said) the words but the occasional hug or maybe just walking around the street for awhile in silence was nice.

* * *

 **Lie no. 40:**

He remembered one time that he took Squalo to the countryside to drop of Rosa with Sirius. It was awkward for him. Sirius spent the entire time trying to tease them as Harry tried to melt into the sofa. Rosa was laughing off in the side.

At the end of all of it, Squalo looked at him and said "Your family is insane"  
"You're preaching to the choir."

* * *

 **Truth no. 5:**

It was Rosa's twelfth birthday when Squalo finally told him about Rosa's flame. Que an hour long conversation about dying will flames and Rosa being an active lightning. Apparently, at her age without proper training, it could have negative effects on her health and that Squalo was more than willing to teach her how to control them for safety (even if he didn't mention that last bit).

Harry fell in love a bit more (which, frankly, he didn't even think was possible).

* * *

 **Lie no. 41:**

Squalo was sitting on his usual chair at the bar as Harry cleaned the counter before lock up when his phone went off with a text from Sirius (even Harry was surprised when he found out Sirius learnt how to) saying that Rosa had somehow snuck into the kitchen and had a bunch of sugary treats and a whole bottle of coke. The following video of the small girl running around, bouncing off the walls and being all around hyper, was amazing. He ended up using the counter to keep himself standing as Squalo gave him an odd look.

Passing the phone over, Squalo watched the video and let out a laugh. "Voi! She's crazy!"

* * *

 **Lie no. 42:**

Somehow the Saturday afternoon was spent watching soap operas in French with Squalo and Rosa. It was pretty funny with Harry and Rosa making an odd relationship between Louis who was dating Chloe but also secretly in a relationship with Nathan. And Nathan's grandmother was secretly the runaway bride of a rich man and Nathan was his son born out of wedlock. It was amazing.

Well. _it was_ until Squalo told them he could speak french and that was not what was happening at _all._

"Squalo! Don't kill it for us!" Rosa cried, attempting to attack the assassin with a pillow.

* * *

 **Lie no. 43:**

When he walked into his flat with the grocery shopping, his jaw dropped There in the kitchen was Squalo and Rosa in front of the stove struggling to make food. It was oddly.. Adorable.

"Voi! Where is the salami?!" Squalo roared, freaking out as drops of oil shot out of the pan.  
"It's on the right, idiot! And so is the chicken stock and milk!" she exclaimed.  
"What even is this recipe?"  
"It's amazing and Harry's favourite, don't complain!"

Harry stood in the door frame and just let out a small chuckle. Pushing off the wall, he sat down and watched some more before Rosa glared at him for a little second "Aren't you going to help?!" she roared at him.

"Nahhh," he replied, smiling at their difficulties "You seem to be doing great!"

* * *

 **Lie no. 44:**

Watching Squalo try to teach Rosa how to control her flames were hilarious.

He was trying to give her a more calm centre in an attempt to stop making her flames go crazy via meditation. Wasn't working. She kept getting distracted, and at one point she actually fell asleep. Another time, she tried to mess with Squalo's hair. The last occurrence, she snuck off and poured water all over him, which resulted in the two running down the streets with Rosa laughing her head off.

These two were his family, and that was perfect.

* * *

 **TADA! Despite working on this for hours today on my phone andon my laptop, I really like this chapter because it focuses on the growing bond between Squalo and Rosa whilst also adressing the relationship between Harry and Squalo. Hope you enjoy, also thank you to the guest who gave me the note about the issue from last chapter. Tired writer is tired... constantly.**


	8. 7th Set of Lies

**Lie no. 45:**

It was a Saturday morning about a year and a half of knowing each other when he met Squalo's coworkers. He was sitting on his usual chair at the bar as Harry cleaned the counter before lock up, after he heard the door open. "Apologies, we're clos-" he began, before looking up and seeing two adults, a baby and a child walked in all in the same uniform Squalo usually is.

"Ooooo, so this is where Squ-chan spends his free time?" the flamboyant adult says

"Voi! What are you idiots doing here?!" Squalo roared.  
"Shishishi, it's boring when the strategic commander isn't around to tease!" the child, who seemed to be a little older than Rosa, snickered. Harry just put down his rag and gotten out a glasses for the adults, a bottle of coke for the child and and a glass of orange juice for the baby.

"What are you names?" Harry asked casually "I can't keep calling you 'those guys Squalo knows'."  
"Lussuria, but you can call me Luss," the bright one said  
"Female pronouns?" he asked passing over a beer. For a moment Lussuria was speechless as the bartenders accommodating nature and his disarming kindness before nodding with an easy smile.  
"I'm a prince, I don't need to introduce myself to commoners." the blond said arrogantly ('Note to self, keep him away from Rosa they will get along like a house on fire' Harry thought to himself).

"He's Belphegor," Squalo told him. "He's Levi A Than and the baby is Mammon."

After that, an awkward silence blanketed the bar and they all sat until Squalo decided to just leave with his co workers while he went to the toilet. As he was locking up, he got a text saying 'I'll see you tomorrow'. He couldn't help but think Squalo **could** sense how awkward his coworkers made things for him (knowing Squalo, that was absolutely true and he would refuse to accept the fact that it was true).

* * *

 **Truth no. 6:**

As the Varia walked down the street toward a waiting car as Lussuria looked at Squalo and asked "Is he the guy?"  
"What guy?" Belphegor asked  
"The guy Squalo is dating," Lussuria teased  
"He dates?" Mammon mumbled.

"Voi! Knock it off!" he roared. As they got to the car, he was absolutely annoyed. Slipping into the seat, he heard the sun say: "He's a strong, active cloud Squ-chan,"

Gritting his teeth, he growled "We aren't talking about this."  
"If he can handle Squalo, he could probably handle Xanxus…" Mammon mumbled, dodging the sword Squalo always carried under the arcobaleno's flames. "What's his territory, peasant?"  
"It's his family." Squalo answered

* * *

 **Lie no. 46:**

When Harry found a sword in his apartment, he took in stride.

When Harry saw Rosa with a sword, however, he spent two hours chewing into Squalo and the assassin set aside his pride, apologised and kept his swords away.

* * *

 **Truth no. 7:**

"Tell him, Squalo."  
"The less he knows, the safer Harry is, kid."

* * *

 **Truth no. 8:**

When someone broke into Harry's apartment, Squalo had to tell him. Told him about the Varia. About the Cradle Affair.

They took a break for the month.

It was mid-July when Harry opened his doors to Squalo again. Things were still awkward and patchy and clunky… but after a while things went back to normal (well… as normal as these things can get).

* * *

 **Lie no. 47:**

At this point Harry and Rosa had both been somewhat inducted into the mafia, and with their flames and association with Squalo, they would soon become targets. To keep Rosa relatively safer, she was inducted into Mafia Academy's lower secondary school (immediately becoming a menace to both faculty and students alike) and she and her brother moved in with him.

Oddly enough, Squalo's job was what affected him the least. Squalo was proud, and unlike that Granger girl from Hogwarts (whatever happened to her in the end?) Harry didn't exactly have such a strict moral code. As long as Rosa was safe, Harry didn't care what Squalo did. And the Varia were the best of the best, being part of the organisation proved Squalo was as such. It was a pride thing.

* * *

 **Lie no. 48:**

Six knocks on the front door woke him up. Crawling out of bed, he pulled on Squalo's discarded sweater and walked out of the room. Seeing his boyfriend (still not entirely sure, even after all that happened) about to put his sword down, he waved him off and went to the door. With his hand on the doorknob, he paused when he heard 'Shishishi! Open the door Squalo!'

Turning away, he returned to Squalo. Blandly, he said "You might want to deal with this one."

Watching carefully as Squalo put his blade on the coffee table, kicked away his maintenance kit and walked to the door. He laughed as the man opened the door and saw the wing-like daggers embedded in the door. "VOI! HAVEN'T I TOLD YOU TO STOP DOING THAT SHITTY PRINCE!"

Suddenly a water bottle barely missed Harry's face and slammed into back of Squalo's head.

"Shut up! Some of us are trying to sleep!" Rosa screamed at the top of her lungs.

"VOI! WHEN I GET MY HANDS ON YOU!" he roared. Belphegor watched on and laughed at the the arguing duo. "Now, now, Rosa apologise," Harry ordered "And Squalo, please lower your volume, Rosa is right."

* * *

 **Lie no. 49:**

Harry knew from the moment he met the child that if Belphegor and Rosa met, they would get along like a house on fire. He was right.

The two spent every moment playing horrifically gory video games and going out of their way to annoy Squalo. The prince might have been Rosa's first friend (outside of Harry, but technically he was her brother). So when Rosa came home from school with a report saying she got into a fight and Belphegor was standing behind her with a cheshire grin, snickering and seemingly having the time of his life.

"So you're not horrible, for a peasant," he admitted  
"Damn straight I'm not!" she grumbled as Harry signed the report.  
"Belphegor, why are you even here?"  
"A prince doesn't have to answer a peasant."

* * *

 **Lie no. 50:**

When he opened the front door to the apartment, Harry was expecting the delivery guy with his new tablet, he was _not_ expecting Squalo's happy coworker. "Lussuria?" The bright assassin smiled and pulled him into a short hug before pulling him into the apartment. "Harry, dear! I'm so sorry we haven't talked before, Squalo is a kill joy. I love your hair, by the way" she complimented, patting the top of his head and staring at his straight black hair for a moment.

As the green haired fighter walked into the apartment, Harry couldn't help but awkwardly tuck his hair behind his ear. "Um… what exactly are you here for?"

"Squalo was worried about your little Rosa, even if he would never admit it-" she began

"You know Rosa?"

"Belphegor told us about the bottle incident and Squ-chan complains a little. Anyway, Squalo wanted to make sure she was relatively safe. Said she might learn Muay Thai better than swords, plus he said they don't get along. Is she here?"

"No, she's at school… but you can wait in the living room if you like. Would you like some tea?"

"Thank you, dear."

* * *

 **Lie no. 51:**

Unlocking the door, Squalo walked in and tossed his keys to the side as Rosa followed him in. Every since Belphegor inadvertently got her into a fight, Harry had been adamant that someone went to get her from school to make sure that 'Prince the Ripper' couldn't egg her on again into another fight. She was still in trouble for the last one.

Stepping into the living room, he was surprised when he saw Harry and Lussuria drinking tea and laughing with each other. "Voi! What the hell is going on?!"

"Ah, Squ-chan! Is that Rosa? You're adorable! I'm Lussuria, call me big sis Luss, ok?" she said, waving at the small, confused girl. "Whatever," the girl replied.

"I work with Squalo,"

"So you're Varia, like him and Belphegor?" Rosa inquired, kicking off her shoes and falling onto the empty couch. "Yes, you know?"

"I was a street kid, 'course I knew. Harry knows because some idiot tried to get to him and Squalo loved him to much to disappear."

"Voi! SHUT UP ROSA!" Squalo commanded "Stop telling people about my life!"

"Whatever!" she retorted as Lussuria laughed a bit at their banter.

"Well, Rosa, I'm here to teach you Muay Thai," she expanded

"Does that mean I can learn to kick ass?"

* * *

 **Lie no. 52:**

Mammon was an interesting character. They obviously knew who Harry was and they appreciated how well he played the British wizarding world. They were an interesting person (child?) to discuss magical theory with. It was nice to talk to someone other than Sirius.

"Are you planning to tell Squalo?"

"Mhmm, I'm waiting for the paperwork. I'm planning to tell Rosa too,"

"Are you going to blood adopt her?"

"It will be her choice in the end, but I might."

* * *

 **So I was reading the Varia arc again and I'm super annoyed by Iemitsu's callously making Lambo the lightning guardian, and quite frankly I'm really annoyed by the fact that Takashi (a kid who had been learning to fight for about a month?) beat Squalo (aka the sword emperor). May redo the Varia arc because of that.**


	9. 8th Set of Lies

**Lie no. 52:**

It was mid-winter when Squalo gave Harry a letter in a manila envelope as he walked into the apartment. Cutting it open with a pocket knife the assassin tossed over, he stared at the letter in his hand. Turning to the man who was putting his coat up, he asked "Squalo, what is this?"  
"After the Cradle Affair and an incident a couple of years back with a traitorous bastard, we want to make sure we don't have any liars when the boss gets back."

"So?"  
"Voi, we want you to be our recruitment officer. Weed out the liars," he explained "You won't need to deal with older ones unless we have suspicions. So, are you going to do it?"

* * *

 **Lie no. 53:**

His first day of work was… odd.

Somehow, he found himself standing (read as: cowering) beside Squalo in front of a line of ten recruits. All of them had passed every other requirement. Except now they had to pass Harry's test. Every one of them were annoyed and contemptful at the idea that they had to submit to a 'crack scientist'.

Flipping through the pages of the clipboard, he skimmed through the shortened personnel files. Pausing at a particular one, he looked up and stared at the mullet-headed man that was the lone storm in the group. Tapping the loud Rain beside him on the shoulder, he whispered: 'I need to talk to the storm."

Nodding his head, Squalo yelled "Voi! Congratulations, Rabia! You're up!"

* * *

 **Lie no. 54:**

"I'm sorry, but I can't, for the life of me, understand you," Harry began "Everyone else was angry. Eyebrows down and together, glaring, and narrowing of the lips. What people don't know about rage is that it is slow and gradual. Sort of like opening a tap. Your's however, was too fast. It was more jagged. Fake. And you even had a brief microexpression of fear, when everyone else just had contempt. Why?"

"Aren't you the psychic?" the storm said with disgust  
"I'm not a psychic, _Rabia_ , was it?" he clarified "I read expressions. Together they show me if you're being deceitful. I can't tell you why you are lying."

"I'd love to know, Rabia."

* * *

 **Truth no. 9:**

Turns out Rabia was one of the guys hired by CEDEF to infiltrate the Varia. Sort of like a contingency plan to make sure that Xanxus wouldn't get free. The resulting argument between Iemitsu and Squalo was ear splitting. Harry didn't even want to be there, he wanted to be back at home (since when did Squalo's apartment become home?).

The CEDEF boss made his skin crawl; reminded him way too much of Dumbledore. He had his student call him _Master_ and told him to speak in some arbitrary and archaic form of language. From what Squalo told him, the creep had a wife and son he never saw (yet another reason to hate him).

He wasn't even ashamed that he had done it, rather he was more ashamed that he was caught. Especially by a civilian of all things. When he found out that Harry was the one who had caught his operation the man looked enraged. He had roared about omerta and the like, easily being shut down by Squalo when he said that Harry was a candidate for Xanxus' cloud guardian and was the Varia's new recruitment officer. Which resulted in another argument about Xanxus never getting free.

He needed some painkillers to deal with his migraine.

* * *

 **Lie no. 55:**

A couple of months later, the other officers came to him. They had a plan to free Xanxus, but they would need his help and a place to hide out. Sirius was more than willing to give them a place to go as the Varia HQ was too likely to be ambushed in case they were caught.

Apparently, the ice that Xanxus was locked in were hardened sky flames. Bad news was that the only Skies they knew were allied with the Vongola and releasing Xanxus would terminate their alliance so none of them would help him. Good news was that Sky flames had the attribute of harmony, a perfect harmony of all six other flame types.

They were going to need to prepare.

* * *

 **Truth no. 10:**

Once he got the paperwork from the ministry, Harry went straight to the Varia HQ and to Squalo's office. Slipping in, Harry smiled at him. "Hey."  
"Voi, what are you doing here."  
"I need to tell you something. I wanted to tell you earlier but it has it's own form of omerta. If I told you, I'd get deported and your memories of me would have been removed."

"What the hell?"

Harry pulled out his holly wand and spent the next hour telling Squalo about magic and how he had done everything to leave it behind. But… he was willing to use it if it meant the Varia could have Squalo back.

"I'll need a bit of help finding Xanxus' exact location so we don't end up with missing limbs but-" he began before he was dragged into a hug. "Voi, you just made this job so much easier for us."

"You're not… bothered by my magic?" he asked, his voice muffled by the man's shoulder  
"We have omerta, you have that… what do you call it?"  
"The International Statute of Secrecy of 1692."

"Wait, how can you tell me about it?"  
"... I may have written you and the other officers of the Varia down as one of the benefactors for my assets. Considering somethings in my vaults are magical, the only way you would get it, is if you knew about magic."  
"Assets?"

Harry sighed before going into his heritage.

* * *

 **Lie no. 56:**

With Mammon using their mist flames to carve the image of Xanxus prison in Harry's mind, it was fairly easy to apparate from Sirius's place to the Iron Fort basement and move Xanxus with him. Once he got back, slowly but surely they combined their flames to make a singular sky flame and melted Xanxus bit by bit.

Lussuria then spent the next week using his sun flames to heal as much of the burns as possible but they would scar. And magic couldn't be used until after the man woke up so they could assess the full damage to his body after eight years of incarceration.

* * *

 **Truth no. 11:**

Xanxus first woke up about a month after his freedom, aches and sores in his joints. He was in the middle of trying to use his extremities when Rosa snuck into his room for yet another time in an attempt to avoid getting in trouble. Tilting his head to the side, he looked at the preteen that slid to the floor with her knees to her chest.

"Oi, trash, where the hell am I?" he growled. The girl looked up at him for a moment, before rolling her eyes. "Good to see you're awake, sleeping beauty. You're in the countryside. Big brother helped the Varia break you out." she explained. His hand twitched as he went for a glass that wasn't there as she got to her feet she left the room.

Five minutes later a young man and Squalo (is it really? He looks so much older, his hair is so much longer, has he been loyal for that long?) "Shitty shark," he began, his voice raspy from eight years of disuse "How long did that bastard keep me locked up?"  
"Eight years, boss. Voi, this is Harry, he helped us bust you out," Squalo introduced. The man gave a serene smile and wave "I apologise for my sister. She and Belphegor caused some damaged and she ran."

He was a cloud. The flames were oddly calming and shielded him better than Levi's lightning. Was this _his_ cloud?

* * *

 **Lie no. 57:**

When Harry left the room, the first thing he did was send a letter to Luna. His friend was odd, but she had become one of the best healers he knew. She arrived a day later and he introduced her to Xanxus. Slowly but surely, her magic allowed him to regain function of his limbs so that it was as if he was never frozen.

Then Luna disappeared like the wind.

* * *

 **Lie no. 58:**

Walking into Xanxus' room with a new uniform that he had _ordered_ be brought to him. He was amused by the man's actions but did them anyway. Passing them over, he sat down and looked at him. "So what will you do?" he asked "Because if you're going to go with revenge… I have a fairly good idea on how to get it."  
"Explain." Xanxus commanded

"Let's ruin Iemitsu Sawada's life."

* * *

 **TADA! Xanxus has arrived! This is gonna be fun, and I can only hope that it will be great. Iemitsu now has the Varia senior officers, and a vindictive teenage girl coming after him. Yes, there will be a Varia arc, but not like the one in canon. It will most likely be similar to John Tucker Must Die, sort of like the Varia doing everything in their power to undermine Iemitsu (but it doesn't work as well as they hoped in some situations) I really want to rewatch that now that I think about it...**

 **To people who are wondering how the 'Lies' and 'Truths' are set up (and the one guest reviewer who I accidently sent on a wild goose chase to find lies in the 'lies'), Harry views the world as a place full of liars -as said in the prologue. Because of this Harry views everything as a lie. The 'lies' (while they may not necessarily have actual lies in them) are simply a sort of baseline for him due to the fact that he needs something to compare the 'Truths' to. 'Truths' being things that he believes in so much that he feels to be as fact.** **There are some instances, as you know, where 'Truths' aren't from Harry's focus but the point still stands.**

 **Does that make sense?**

 **For the record, this is unbeta'd and I'm often running on time constraint. Most mistakes you will see are because I switched to my phone and auto correct decided to mess with me and I didn't realise.**

 **Last but by far the most important, I'm super grateful for all the people who follow, favourite and review. You are doing wonders for my confidence. Sadly my updates will slow down for the next few weeks because I'll be super busy. They may speed back up again afterwards though.**


	10. 9th Set of Lies

Bold is Italian after lie 64, and general is japanese after they are in Japan. You can probably tell from the context. I MAY DO A DINOXFEMHARRY THING! IDK! (Why am I so hyped?) Tell me what you think!

* * *

 **Lie no. 59:**

The Varia and their two new additions (how did that happen?) sat in the dining room as Harry pulled out a clipboard. "Don't ask me where I got it," he said as he saw Lussuria begin to open her mouth.

"Now! We are now beginning operation: Ruin Iemitsu!" Harry declared  
"VOI! What?!" Squalo exclaimed.  
"Look, idiot," Rosa began "You're all already in deep water because we broke out Xanxus, not that I'm against it, 'cus he's amazing. But let's be honest here, Vongola Nono screwed him over. We don't need to screw him over to mess with him, let's just crush the belief he has in his advisor! That's so much more fun!"  
Belphegor looked at her for a moment, before snickering "Shishishishi, I like the way you think."

At this point, everyone turned their heads toward Xanxus, who was sitting leisurely against a chair that looked like a throne (how did he even get that?). Taking a large gulp of his wine, he looked at them before saying "Do it, trash. And don't mess up."

* * *

 **Lie no. 60:**

Step 1: Getting in.

Getting into CEDEF was fairly easy. Squalo burst in with Harry at his heels, ranting up a storm of profanities about how he was getting sick and tired of finding CEDEF spies in the Varia (spies that didn't even exist). Mammon had gotten them access to the camera feeds so Rosa and Xanxus could watch from Sirius' home. Harry could hear his sister's running commentary, which was 100% insults, about everything they saw through the earpiece he was wearing. Every once in awhile Xanxus would say something condescending which she would respond to in kind.

It was nice to see them getting along.

* * *

 **Lie no. 61:**

Step 2: Recon.

Once he and Squalo were in place and setting the perfect distraction, Mammon and Belphegor snuck in. The arcobaleno went about under a blanket of mist flames, listening in to any gossip they could find; whilst the prince went to the dark recesses of the CEDEF archives, grabbing files on everything he could find that Iemitsu had his fingers in. Including the files of his guardians and his apprentice.

* * *

 **Lie no. 62:**

Step 3: Debrief

"So what did we find out?" Harry asked the table. Mammon stood on the table and used their flames to make a simple diagram to support their explanation. "I got a lot from his workers. But the best of what I found Iemitsu talks on and on about his beautiful wife and son. Says they mean the world to him. But… some of the lower level grunts, say he had an affair with his rain, Oregano. No one knows what came of it, but some think she got pregnant considering she disappeared for a couple of months." Floating above them were a series of images of Iemitsu, two faceless people in the place of the man's wife and child, and an image of Oregano.

A whiskey glass went flying over their heads and smashed against the wall opposite to Xanxus. The scars on his face began to grow and lengthen. "That bastard," the sky growled "He goes on and on about family and how it's sacred. That I would _never_ understand! And then he does this!"

Rosa sighed and passed him another glass to throw.

"Shishishishi, It gets better." Belphegor chuckled, throwing a file onto the table.  
"How?" Rosa asked  
"I was looking the personnel files on the way here, and would you look at the resemblance between Iemitsu and his apprentice. And the similarity between the kid and Oregano."

The wave of wrath flames from Xanxus began to grow and cracks began to form on the new glass that Rosa had passed him. Harry looked at him and sighed, pouring him another glass. "Drink," he ordered "It will calm you down."  
"Are you sure you are a doctor?"  
"Who said I was a doctor?"

Drinking an entire gulp of his whiskey, he looked at Rosa as she said "Let's tell his wife. Even if she doesn't believe us, a single seed of doubt can make her do most of the work for us. Then we throw it all at the Vongola Don. Show him all the stupid crap he's done, then ask him that if Iemitsu can't be faithful to his own wife, who says he'll be faithful to the Vongola?"

Harry paused. Stared at his sister, before staring at his lover. Then back at his sister, then back at Squalo, before saying to the man:

"You've infected my sister. I can't decide if I'm happy and proud that she can make these kinds of plans and protect herself; or mad that she's a bit crazy now."

* * *

 **Lie no. 63:**

Step 4: Become friends with the wife and son

Step 4 was most likely Rosa's favourite. Via the help of Mammon (and a lot of Harry's money), she and her brother moved into the house next to the Sawada's. Rosa joined the Namimori middle school and ended up in the heir's class.

A dial tone, ringing:

" _Squalo, we just got here. Are you worrying about us already?"  
_ " _VOI! Aren't you the one who said you attract trouble?"  
_ " _Yes, but that doesn't mean you aren't deflecting."  
_ A sigh from the other line  
" _Be safe. I hear an arcobaleno is there,"  
_ " _I will, don't worry."  
_ Silence  
" _I love you, I'll call you later."_

* * *

 **Lie no. 64:**

Somehow, without even trying on Harry's part, Nana invited her new neighbours over for dinner. Rosa was playing on Harry's phone through the entire thing, sending irritating message after irritating message to Squalo.

"Ne, Rosa-chan, how do you like Namimori?" the housewife asked.  
"I… like it… a bit? No, a lot," she said, bouncing the words around a bit. She detested having to actually _learn_ Japanese, when Harry could easily use his magic to give her an easy grasp over it. Apparently, it would be odd for her to suddenly be great at the language despite not being great at every other subject, and being a polyglot wouldn't help them in the long run.

"Rosa, what's your native language?" the arcobaleno tutoring the heir asked  
"Language? Oh! Italian," she told him in japanese.  
" **Ah! I speak it as, well!** " Reborn said " **Now, what are people associated with the Varia are doing here?** "

Harry paused in the middle of chewing. Swallowing, he gave an enigmatic smile to the hitman, before saying " **I didn't expect you to know, but then again I really shouldn't have underestimated an arcobaleno.** "  
" **Who doesn't know about the Varia's new recruitment officer and his apprentice? But I have to know, are you really sleeping with Superbi?** "  
" **Sorry, I don't kiss and tell.** "

Reborn laughed, scaring Tsuna even more than he already was. The Italian being thrown around was terrifying him. For all he knew, his new neighbours were probably associates of Reborn and were probably there to 'help him become a good boss'. Rosa placed a hand on his shoulder "Relax," she told him.

" **Why** _ **are**_ **you here?** "  
" **Isn't it obvious? We're here to cause chaos.** "  
" **I see. Tell me how it goes?** "  
" **I won't need to. You'll know it when you see it.** "

* * *

 **Lie no. 65:**

After a while, Nana decided Harry would be her new friend, and Rosa joined the next generation Vongola in school. Gokudera immediately hated her, as he knew about her connection to the Varia. He had _been_ there in the Mafia Academy when she joined and could easily say she was a menace. The two argued like cats and dogs, not unlike the way that she argued with Squalo (maybe even like the way she argued with Xanxus, but that was pushing it a bit).

She remembered the way Harry reacted when he saw Tsuna's lightning guardian. Her brother was enraged. A _five_ year old was chosen! It was as if the man didn't care what happened to these children.

She couldn't wait for Harry to spill the guts.

* * *

 **Lie no. 66:**

After Rosa's japanese got better, it was a lot easier for her to make comebacks against Gokudera. It was ironic… Gokudera, of all people, was the one to help her with the language. Occasionally even translating things into Italian when she was completely lost (might have been because Tsuna asked but she would take what she could get). It was (god, kill her for admitting this) nice that she now had friends other than Belphegor (did he count as a friend? He spent most of his time trying t get her into fights. At least it meant she could practice her Muay Thai).

* * *

 **Lie no. 67:**

Tapping her pen against the table, she stared at her textbook as she attempted to work through the questions during break. _Tap, tap, tap_. Over and over. Until a sharp kick landed on the back of her chair. Turning around, she saw the storm glaring at her. "Stop" he ordered.  
"I can't help it," she replied "I fidget, _sorry._ "

Standing up, he walked in front of her. "What are you doing here?"  
"Learning."  
"I meant in Namimori. Are you here to harm the tenth?"

She sighed before putting the pen down. Folding her hands in a way she had seen her brother do when he was annoyed and trying not to punch something, she looked up at him and switched to Italian. " **No, I am not here to harm your boss. His father, on the other hand? I make no promises... The skeezy asshole… Frankly, I respect the Vongola heir, he's good, _naive_ , but ultimately good. He loves you guys, like I love my brother. He'd be a good boss, once he got past the violence of it all.**"

Gokudera stared at her for a moment, unsure of what to say aside from the simple nod he gave her. " **Just… be there for him in the fallout of what's gonna happen. He'll need friends like you guys to help him through it. And Miss Nana, but I'm pretty sure big brother will help her out, if Iemitsu decides to be even** _ **more**_ **of a scumbag. He has a soft spot for her.** "

The boy looked at her as she unfolded her hands and went back to staring at her work. After a few moments, he grabbed an empty chair before placing it in front of her and grabbing the textbook. "OI!" she exclaimed, only to be surprised when he asked " **What are you stuck on, annoying girl?** "

* * *

 **I loved writing this, I delved into my inner secret agent for some weird reason when I was writing this. I can't wait for the fallout of all this. Reborn getting along with Harry was not something I expected when I started this. Rosa and Gokudera being friends was planned, but my fingers/muse may have other ideas. Who knows! Also, you guys can speculate who said 'I love you' in the phone call between Harry and Squalo. It's generally open to interpretation. I did not expect for the focus of the second half to shit to Rosa but it was fun to focus on her for once ^-^**

 **Credit to 27x18 for the backstory of Basil and the affair between Iemitsu and Oregano. I love their fanfiction Turning Point, it's so adorable and just makes me smile, you should absolutely check it out!**

 **Thank you for all who reviewed since the last chapter, and to those who were supportive when I spoke about my delays. I wrote this especially for you guys!**

 **Still don't have a beta. If you're interested, send me a PM!**


	11. 10th Set of Lies

**Lies no. 68:**

Opening the door to Tsuna's door after school on a Friday, she walked in and dropped her bag on the floor. Tsuna, Gokudera and Yamamoto stared at her for a few moments before the Vongola heir asked "Um… Rosa-san… what are you doing here?"

She stared at him for a few seconds before sitting down on the floor beside them saying, "My brother's boyfriend came to visit, I wanted to give them space." the switched to italian and said " **By that, I mean that I didn't want to be there when they started making out** …"

To which Gokudera choked, as Tsuna and Yamamoto stared in confusion.

* * *

 **Truth no. 12:**

Harry sat calmly as he leaned into Squalo's side as they stared silently at the tv. "Where's Rosa?" the assassin asked  
"Next door."  
"At the heir's house?"  
"Uhuh,"  
"What time is she coming back?"  
"Really late."

Suddenly, Squalo got to his feet and pulled him towards his bedroom.

* * *

 **Lie no. 69:**

Later in the afternoon, Gokudera was walking through the street towards his apartment with Rosa, who was going toward a nearby corner store for milk (which was apparently running out in their house, but then again there is the possibility that Harry said that to stall for time).

" **So Superbi is here?** " **  
**" **Yup. Shit's gonna hit the fan, possibly tomorrow? Just giving you a heads up.** " **  
**" **Thanks.** "

* * *

 **Lie no. 70:**

Step 5 of Operation Crush Iemitsu -or whatever it's called-: Tell the wife and son (Maybe it was a bit pathetic that they were doing this, but Nana did deserve to know. Such a kind woman didn't need to be with a man like Iemitsu).

It was Saturday afternoon when Harry and Rosa went to Nana's house with Squalo. The duo had timed it just right so that it coincided with Iemitsu's visit. "Let's hope this works…" he mumbled as he knocked on the door.

* * *

 **Truth no. 13:**

It was _not_ pretty.

Iemitsu walked in and started a loud argument in Italian which was diffused by Reborn and Nana. Squalo terrified Tsuna the entire time, the heir was sending him fearful looks every once in awhile as they ate. His father was glaring at the assassin, the assassin was glaring at him and Harry looked awkward.

Then Squalo asked "So did you ever tell your wife?" (because apparently he felt like the situation should be dealt with as if it were a band aid).  
"Tell me what?" Nana asked

"Nothing dear," Iemitsu mumbled as his glare intensified and Harry began to shrinking in on himself. 'Uh oh…' he thought.

"So she knows about Oregano and Basil?"  
"Squalo, **shut up.** "  
"She deserves to know."

"Who are Oregano and Basil?" Nana asked.

The following conversation between them was filled with tears, anger and the like. By the end of it all, Iemitsu had left, Squalo went to call Xanxus and Harry was holding a crying Nana, whilst Tsuna and Rosa snuck out.

* * *

 **Lie no. 71:**

Quietly Rosa walked out of the house and sat down on the front step with Tsuna. After a few moments of silence, he asked "Did you know?" to which she graciously replied "Yes…"

"Why didn't you tell me?"

"There were some things happening, your father angered a lot of people and when we found out, we thought she deserved to know. But your mother trusts him, so unless she saw for herself when he was lying… she probably wouldn't have believed us." she carefully told him, making sure to keep everything truthful and that she didn't mention that it was mostly done for vengeance.

After a few more minutes, she patted him on the back and told him she was going to call Gokudera and Yamamoto, saying he needed them around. She would have called his other guardians but Tsuna's cloud wasn't as nice as Harry was, his mist was in jail and his body double probably wouldn't be the best person to call and his sun was too loud for this kind of thing.

"Rosa?" he called

"Yeah?"

"You may be a bit scary… but you're really nice," he told her with a sad smile.

* * *

 **Lie no. 72:**

Squalo returned to Italy later that week to help the Varia deal with their new batch of recruits, whilst Harry and Rosa stayed in Namimori to comfort Nana. Iemitsu continued to try and plead with his wife despite the promise of divorce papers. Harry easily got her a lawyer to help her combat him and the CEDEF lawyer he would be using, it was the least he could do, considering he ruined her marriage (although when he spoke to Tsuna, the boy refused to acknowledge his part in all of it. He had said all the blame could only be directed at his _father's_ callous actions).

Gokudera kept giving Rosa judging looks (which wasn't that out of ordinary) and he was willing to help with her study problems (which easy basically every topic. Honestly, why couldn't she just learn things in Italian?). Tsuna was slowly dealing with the fact his parents were getting divorced, his friends all but forcing him to lean on them (he kept telling them that he didn't mean to be a burden, the silly child). He was glad he had Rosa as a friend, she was like this impenetrable shield that stood between him and the students of Namimori that couldn't help but try to get themselves involved (they were terrified of her).

Both he and Nana couldn't help but feel that, soon… everything would be ok after a while.

* * *

 **Shorter than usual, but I felt that this needed to be dealt with. I did not particularly like writing this set, which is probably why it is so short, because Nana does not deserve what I have done. So glad it is over and done with. Prompts would be nice, throw them at me! Also, I'm putting the Dino x Fem!Harry thing on the back burner for now, so that I can do another drabble series for Magi.** **For anyone who likes the series it should be put up fairly soon. Hope you enjoyed this chapter ^-^**


	12. 11th Set of Lies

**Lie no. 73:**

Everything was OK for a little while after that, Nana was able to get full custody of Tsuna (and much of Iemitsu's money because the idiot hadn't signed a prenuptial) and she began to become a lot more aware of the things happening around her.

Then Reborn went missing.

* * *

 **Truth no. 14:**

After the first few days, Harry began to get worried. Of course it wasn't that bad, because Reborn was the strongest hitman in the world. If anything, he would be fine.

Then Tsuna and Gokudera went missing. Then Yamamoto, Kyoko and the Haru girl he had seen around. And then his sister. Before he knew it, the entire Vongola tenth generation was gone. And he hadn't been able to do anything about it.

It was at that point he began having a break down.

Grabbing his wand from the draw he kept it in, he began throwing wards up around the area as his fingers dialed Squalo's number (he'd learnt the wards soon after he and Rosa moved in with Squalo, a contingency plan of sorts).

* * *

 **Truth no. 15:**

Nearly a week went by before he had the information dump which had the nerve of calling itself a dream. And Rosa had been returned to him. When she made her way inside the house, he grabbed her into a hug.

If she felt a few tears bleeding through the shoulder of her shirt, she didn't say a word.

* * *

 **Lie no. 74:**

Dialing. Ringing.

" _I'm going to be staying in Namimori to make sure you guys don't lose the heir, again"  
_ " _Oh? Any other reason?"  
_ " _Voi, why would I have any other reason?"  
_ A chuckle  
" _Nothing."_

* * *

 **Lie no. 75:**

It was a calm morning as Rosa physically dragged Squalo into walking her to school. 'Because I do not want to face the demon girls at the school on my own' was her reasoning.

Mothers and her fellow female students stared and whispered as the two bickered down the street:

"Why are you so loud?"  
"Why are you so obnoxious?!"  
"I swear if my brother wouldn't hate me I probably would have stabbed you by now!"

It was nice for things to be back to normal.

* * *

 **Lie no. 76:**

When Rosa finally made her way into the class, everyone stopped talking for a moment before many girls rushed up to her. Asking who the man walking with her was, how she knew him, where he was from ("Because he is obviously not Japanese") and Rosa couldn't help but seethe:

"He's Squalo, he's my brother's boyfriend and he's Italian. He's 24 and way too old for any of you fangirls."

Because, let's face it, those girls were creepy and they needed a good ol' slap to the face from Reality.

* * *

 **Lie no. 77:**

The Vongola heir and his closest guardians (Gokudera, Yamamoto and, oddly enough, Rosa) were lying about in the Black living room after school staring blankly at the empty tv screen that haunted them since the earthquake that had occurred when they returned from the future. The heat was blistering and boiling. Their skin all but melting under the rays. Every fan in the house had been turned on and faced in their direction but it didn't seem to work.

Then the door opened. All of the children tensed silently as they saw Squalo of the Varia walk in, having heard stories of the organisation from Reborn and Gokudera. Then they all paused as Harry walked in behind him, only for the bespectacled man to have the shopping he carried stolen by the assassin and taken to the kitchen.

The students, minus Rosa (who had gotten used to Squalo being Squalo) tilted their heads to the side and watched the couple's interaction.

"You don't have to do that..."  
"It's fine."  
"Squalo, shouldn't the kids be here by now?"  
"They are," the assassin said and pointed in their direction, causing Harry to turn and notice them. "Oh, hi! Are you all ok? You look like you're all on your way to death row."  
"The heat. It burns," Rosa explained simply  
"Ahhh. Well, you do know there is some ice cream in the fridge, right?"  
"What?!" the Vongola group exclaimed, rushing for the fridge. Narrowly missing Squalo in their dash, they ignored his roar as they went for their bounty.

* * *

 **Truth no. 16:**

One particular night after returning, Rosa couldn't sleep. Memories from the future plaguing her dreams. When Harry woke up for a midnight snack, he saw her sitting on the couch looking deep into her empty cup as if attempting to divine the future from the leaves left behind.

Grabbing a bottle of water, he sat down beside her silently. Hoping that she would understand that he would be there if she wanted to talk, for hew knew what scared her so deeply due to halted memories that had been passed to him from an alternate version of himself. She only said one thing:

"The only reason I survived… is because you took a hit for me. And uncle Sirius had long since died... Please don't leave me like that. I love you two, too much."  
"We won't, Rosa. Never."

When Squalo finally made his way into the living room the next morning, he saw the two asleep together on the couch with a Russian soap opera playing.

* * *

 **Lie no. 78:**

Rosa's box weapon was a turtle.

Well, technically it was a leatherback sea turtle at it's highest possible size of 1.55m. And for some odd reason it was staring at Harry with its beady eyes from its place in the bath tub as it floated about in the water and lightning flames floated off it's large shell.

He needed context. "Rosa!"

* * *

 **Lie no. 79:**

He looked down at the girl as she sat on the couch with the turtle nestled at her feet. She could feel his disappointed gaze as she tried to focus on the lightning turtle instead.

She should have expected this. She knew he would get memories of the future, but she had so stupidly forgotten that his memories were halted. Hadn't even had a chance to see her fight to protect those she now saw as family. Hadn't had the chance to meet Lilou (who she had easily named after his mother, using the french endearment as a recognition).

"Explain, please," he asked her  
'Where is Squalo? This would be so much easier if he was around to help explain where Lilou came from…' she couldn't help but think.

"This is Lilou, she's lightning turtle… my box animal. I thought you might want to meet her, but I wanted her to get used to the house first… Sorry…" she told him  
"Are you sorry that you did it, or that you got caught?" he inquired.

She decided to stay silent. That was more than any answer she could really give.

"Rosa…" he sighed "You are my sister, my lovely little sister, who I would do anything for. When you decide to do crazy things… please tell me first, ok?"  
"Ok…"  
"Thank you, Rosa. And thank you for naming Lilou after my mother."

'He'd noticed!'

* * *

 **Lie no. 80:**

It was one particular afternoon when Lambo started crying and accidentally used the ten year bazooka against Rosa. What everyone saw, was not what everyone was expecting.

She stood tall, as any lightning should, wearing a beautiful dress and the Vongola Lightning ring placed easily on her left ring finger along with a golden band. She had grown her black hair out so that it mimicked Squalo's a bit rather than the short spikey mess she had at the age of twelve.

Oddly enough the first reaction came from Gokudera, who exclaimed "You get married?!" The older woman grinned, so much alike to the grin they knew from a younger Rosa, "Yup, three years going strong, dumbass. Although, that might be because he's smart and knows that if he tried anything I'd break him."

Then her eyes fell on her older brother and somehow her smile got larger and her eyes shone in something akin to pride. "Hey, big bro," she greeted softly "Man, you look so _young_! I now truly realise how small you are."  
"Oi! Just 'cus you're older now, doesn't mean I can't still ground you!" he stated, to which she laughed.  
"Don't be dumb, brother. Well, time is running out," she began Just know, that despite how weird you all are and how much you drive me crazy, I lov-"

Suddenly, her words were halted as a large amount of smoke went off and the Rosa from ten years in the future was replaced with the Rosa from their time. They looked at her in confusion, as she had a shocked expression and a red face. "Are you ok?" her brother asked in worry  
"Ask me again in a few minutes," she mumbled in response.

For some reason she was avoiding Gokudera for a week afterwards.

* * *

 **Truth no. 17:**

Rosa was gonna kill Lambo.

In the numerous occasions that the child hit people with the Ten-Year Bazooka, not once had it hit her. By some stroke of Luck, she had been safe. Until the little twerp and ruined her chance of getting to know her Sky some more (because Tsuna is a naive pain in the ass, but somehow he had joined her _family_ and she couldn't help but tolerate the weirdos that found their way into it).

As the smoke faded, she began to realise a cold hand was holding hers. Turning to the side and looking up, she saw Gokudera (a much older version of her [it hurts to say it] friend) and it was at that point that she screamed.

Yanking her hand away, she backed up with a red face and pointed an accusing finger at him. Yelling: "Why the hell was I holding your hand?!"  
"Ah… well… you see I can't tell you…"

She then proceeded to yell profanities at him in various languages, starting with Japanese, until the five minutes ran out and she was sent back to her time.

* * *

 **Truth no. 18:**

"Come on, we have to get back to the wedding… You ok, Hayato?"

"I forgot how many insults you knew in various languages…"  
"Oh! That was today?!"

* * *

 **TADA! I was originally planning to do the future arc but realised how long it was and I just got super unmotivated and instead of torturing myself with it, I wrote it through Harry's perspective cus we always see the future arc perspective. But don't worry, most of the future arc stays the same but anything different will be noted in any future Lies and Truths.**

 **I love writing this series and I will continue to love it, but soon we will be coming to an end in terms of the actual canon story (I follow the manga). I may do some TYL stuff afterwards, but I'd still like some prompts from all of you. And I only have 1 exam left tomorrow and then I'm done, so my updates should speed up again!**

 **Speaking of TYL, TYL!Rosa is now my favourite. From Truths 17 and 18, you probably realise who she is married to. And in Lie 80 and Truth 18, there is a two part easter egg (1 part in each segment) about something that will be happening in the future.**

 **Also, Lilou is Occitan and the 'ou' means a pet format of something. Do Lilou is a short from of Liliane or in this case Lily. It's pronounce lee-loo**

 **Hope you continue to enjoy the series! Let's get to 100 lies!**


	13. 12th Set of Lies

**Lie no. 81:**

It was early in the morning when Tsuna and his friends were ushered into the Black household by Harry as they waited for Rosa to come down so they could walk to school together. The older man greeted them kindly and began to apologise for the delay when, suddenly, a loud alarm went off. Then another one. Then a large explosion.

"W-what was that?" Tsuna asked in fear  
"That was Rosa's second set of alarm clocks not working," the man told them  
"VOOOOOOOOOOOOOIIIIIIIIIIII!"  
"And _that_ would be?" Gokudera inquired  
"Rosa's third alarm clock. It, _also_ , seems to have failed."

* * *

 **Lie no. 82:**

Rosa sat in her English lesson with her head leaning against her palm. She had zoned out a long time ago and was staring blankly at the board at the front as the teacher wrote on it. Every few seconds her stomach would rumble, which would be followed by a dejected sigh from the young girl."Who's snoring in my lesson?!" the teacher roared. Giving yet another dejected sigh, she raised her hand.

"Teacher it's not snoring. The correct english word would be _hungry_. Do you mean to tell me that the school prohibits stomach-growling?" she asked  
"No, I doubt you'll find a single school in the world with that rule. But it's disturbing the lesson, so do something about it."  
"Is that permission to eat?"  
"More like a tacit decision..."

Whooping, Rosa leaned over to her bag that rested on the floor and shuffled through it, only to pause and raise her hand again.

"What now, Black?"  
"I was running late this morning and it seems I forgot to pack my lunch this morning!" she grinned, to which Yamamoto laughed, Tsuna smiled wearily (how did this kid get used to their madness?) and Gokudera dropped his head on his table with a resound 'bang'.

* * *

 **Lie no. 83:**

She was grateful that Gokudera was nice enough to share his lunch with her (might because she promised to pay him back and Tsuna was the one who asked). The four of them sat on the roof as they waited for time to pass until their next lesson, talking about nonsense.

Somehow their conversation had started at pudding flavours then had somehow devolved into explosions. Harry had always said she would have made an outstanding arsonist if she had been bothered to give it a try and/or had learnt to start fires instead of muay thai (speaking of, she should go back to learning that).

It was nice having friends (y'know, friends that aren't her brother's boyfriend, or said boyfriend's psychotic teenage co-worker).

* * *

 **Lie no. 84:**

It was that time of the year again. Harry was sick.

He was lying on the couch under Merlin knew how many layers of blankets and duvets in an attempt to sweat out his fever (despite how proud he was, Squalo cared in his own way. Wrapping Harry in a cocoon of blankets was one such way). Sighing, he got up as the doorbell rang.

Getting up, he shuffled over to the door as he all but drowned in the sweater he wore (which was obviously Squalo's) and coughed into his sleeve. Opening the door, he stared sleepily at Nana who gave a kind smile and held a pot of… _something_.

It didn't take long for her to usher him inside and under his copious number of blankets before feeding him the soup she brought along and then going so far as to make Harry's favourite noodles (the very one he fondly remembers Rosa and Squalo attempting to make in their home in Italy, which didn't go very well for them, if he remembers correctly).

* * *

 **Truth no. 19:**

For the first time in his life, Harry felt maternal care and he couldn't help but wonder if this is how Rosa feels when he cares for her.

* * *

 **Truth no. 20:**

Regardless of all the death and callousness surrounding it, Harry liked working with the Varia. The members were amusing in their own way and frankly, Harry didn't think he would find another boss that got along with Rosa as well as Xanxus did (if you could call it 'getting along' that is).

And every time Squalo would leave for a job, Harry would stand at the door as the other man put on a glove to hide his metal hand before passing the assassin his go bag (and a kiss)

It was… sickeningly domestic. But that was ok (no matter how much Squalo denied such a thing).

* * *

 **Lie no. 85:**

"How old is John Marston in this game?" Gokudera asked  
"38," Rosa answered  
"Wow."  
"I know right, that's like… 70 in cowboy years."

* * *

(Somehow, Harry was able to convince the teen to come over every couple of days so that he could make sure that the storm was still alive. Her older brother had a serious soft spot for kids and, yes, she was absolutely ignoring the time she got sent to the future because of Lambo and ended up holding hands with an older Gokudera.)

* * *

 **Lie no. 86:**

The unthinkable happened. Luna showed up (which he was used to) but she showed up on the same day the Cavallone Don showed up. The two blonds got along well enough all things considered. That wasn't to say that he understood anything the girl was saying, but he listened to her and would give a warm smile when she started talking about nargles and the like.

"I don't get it…" Harry mumbled to Squalo as they watched the two "How do they get along so well…"  
"Think about it like this. How well did you get along with Xanxus when you two first met?" the assassin asked. "Wait… you mean…"

"Luna harmonised with him?!"  
"Yup, she's a crazy strong mist you know. I wouldn't be surprised if she could make some crazy illusions."

* * *

 **Truth no. 21:**

Luna _could_ in fact 'make some crazy illusions' as Squalo had so tactfully put it. And they were quite terrifying. Not jump scare terrifying but, rather, 'I'm scarred for life and will have nightmares that will haunt me forever' terrifying.

Dino would never know what hit him. At least he wouldn't have to worry about his safety as much? (Harry knew it was the worst excuse he'd come up with in a while but hey, it was the best he could think of).

* * *

 **Lie no. 87:**

Luna had decided to join the Cavallone (even he was shocked) and would be staying indefinitely in Namimori to protect Tsuna ( _lies! Harry had_ seen _her beg her fellow blond so that she could stay, all so she could get to know Rosa!)_. She had quickly moved in with Harry, Squalo and Rosa, taking the spare room as her own.

Then Clara came (yes, that Clara. The best friend from university).

* * *

 **Lie no. 88:**

Harry had stayed in regular contact with his university friend, despite the distance. They had weekly calls so he was aware that she had been having family issues (they didn't approve of her degree choice from the get go, but her plans to work in foreign countries made things worse for them).

He knew she was going to be moving to Japan to pursue a counseling job in an international school, but her plans were sidelined when things went wrong and the original councilor returned to work sooner than expected.

After pulling some strings, Harry was able to get her the place as Namimori middle school's new councilor (thankfully she had learnt Japanese in the two years he hadn't seen her). She had moved in with the four into the Black household ("Voi, how many other people are gonna move in?") soon after.

* * *

 **Truth no. 22:**

Harry wasn't sure how, but Squalo and Clara got along.

* * *

 **Lie no. 88:**

When Harry finally broached the topic of magic and blood adoption to Rosa (Squalo and Luna were there too, watching to see the young girl's response) and he couldn't help but smile when she grinned at him and yelled "HECK YEAH!"

The only downsides to this entire situation was:

a) He would need to go to England to do it sadly and  
b) Blood adoption required two sets of blood donors for the potion

When Squalo asked if they would keep some of the blood afterwards (to which he denied), he was slightly confused. Until the man sighed and said, "Just take mine."

* * *

 **Truth no. 23:**

It was at that point that Harry realised what Clara meant when she said the two of them were already eighty percent married.

* * *

 **Lie no. 89:**

"So you guys are going to England?" Gokudera asked as he walked down the street with Rosa and Tsuna after school. "Yep, Harry has some stuff he needs to do with me and Squalo is going to. Good luck with Luna!" she said grinning at the prospect of leaving them with the new Cavallone mist.

Tsuna was terrified and Gokudera grinned (mostly because Luna didn't judge when he talked about the supernatural).

* * *

 ** _Hello all! Sorry for the late update_** _ **,**_ _ **I got stuck with writer's block which I dealt with via**_ ** _Overwatch and Horizon Zero Dawn. the first few lies are from Paradise Residence, a manga my sister recently got which got me thinking. The John Marston joke in Lie 85 is from one of Outside Xbox's let's play RDR episodes. I honestly recommend their videos, they are hilarious._**

 ** _I'm contemplating skimming over the Inheritence and Arcobaleno arcs so I can focus more on characters and stuff because frankly they won't be different and I wanna focus on Gokudera and Rosa's blossoming relationship. Instead, I'll be doing an England arc and some prompts._**

 ** _Also, Clara and Luna are back! Tbh I always wanted Luna to be one of Dinos gaurdians, I just didn't know how to bring it up. Clara and Squalo being friends was unexpected but Clara seems to be the kind of girl that becomes friends with unexpected people like a socially awkward Harry in university. Speaking of, is Harry becoming less and less socially awkward or is it just me?_**

 ** _Tell me what you think?_** ** _Read, review, prompt, go ahead!  
See you all later ^-^_**


	14. 13th Set of Lies

**Lie no. 90:**

She wasn't sure when it had started but Gokudera had been calling her 'arsonist' for a little while. Tad hypocritic, but she couldn't blame him. He used explosives in a professional capacity, she on the other hand liked fire in a more recreational capacity.

So when he used the nickname she wasn't particularly bothered. Throwing her suitcase into the back of Squalo's car, she walked back over to her friends and fist bumped the storm. "Take care of these assholes for me?"  
"Yeah,"  
"I'll get some stuff for you."

* * *

 **Lie no. 91:**

Harry was putting off going to Britain. He dreaded that Dumbledore would force him to stay, even though Squalo was going (and that immediately meant safety) and Rosa was going, and ever since she had returned from the future, the small girl was a lot more dangerous than she seemed. And that wasn't even bring up the wrath that Xanxus would invoke if anything happened to him (apparently, clouds were rare and a cloud that fit so seamlessly with the Varia was impossible to find). So he couldn't figure out why exactly he sat in the terminal of an airport willingly taking various transit flights instead of just going via a single direct flight.

He was ringing through his fingers when a coffee cup was put in front of him. Wrapping his hands around it, Squalo sat down beside him and kicked his suitcase. The assassin had been smart and set up places that already had his weapons so there was no worries of having to smuggle weapons over and over, so his suitcase had barely any of his things inside. The extra space had been taken up by Rosa who planned to use it for souvenirs for the Vongola Tenth Generations.

Squalo looked at him and sighed before passing 3 tickets over to him. "What are these?"  
"These are the direct flight tickets I exchanged ours with. You're gonna get there eventually, don't make the wait more agonising for yourself by making it longer. I thought you were braver than this."

Had the comment come from anyone else, Harry would have been squawking and kicking up a storm… but Squalo wasn't anyone else. Squalo was Squalo, the man that was willing to become Rosa's other biological recipient (bless magic, because it would mean she would keep her biological gender regardless) taught Rosa how to control her flames, Squalo had seen the best that he could do. He knew that he wouldn't be taken down by some backward group of wizards.

"Thank you…" he said, sniffling and leaning into the man's side. He laughed a bit when Rosa yelled "Are we having a hug time? Let's do this!" and jumped onto them. He pulled the girl into a hug as Squalo grumbled.

* * *

 **Lie no. 92:**

It had been eight years since he had been in England. It was cold and in the middle of winter time. Rosa was unused to travelling and had passed out the second they got into their car to the apartment they were renting for the duration of the trip.

When they arrived, he paused to wake up Rosa before Squalo nudged him out of the way lightly and carried the girl inside instead (so much like an adorable child, oh merlin why couldn't Rosa stay a kid forever?).

* * *

 **Lie no. 93:**

"Are you sure about this?"  
"Why not?"  
"Because Rosa will be your daughter. Biologically and, in the view of the magical world, legally. Squalo this is a huge deal."

"Rosa is insane. She's loud, and nosy and I'm pretty sure she could be a great arsonist. But this kid… she's your's and, as much as it pains me to say it, I'd be honored to have her as mine too y'know?"  
"But what if someone that's against the Varia tries to hurt her?"  
"Voi, they already have. But, even if they do, don't underestimate yourself. Sirius taught you how to use combative magic and I'm not gonna let that mini arsonist get taken or hurt. Stop worrying."

* * *

 **Lie no. 94:**

Diagon Alley was so different to what he remembered. The loudness that reverberated in his memories was replaced by an eerie silence as he they walked towards gringotts. The bright scenery was replaced by coldness that wrapped around him and stole his warmth like a dementor (except, at least at this point in time, Harry had much more happy memories to fuel a patronus charm). He kept his wand in his hair, holding it in place as if it was an ornate hair stick so that it was within reach.

* * *

 **Lie no. 95:**

The ritual was quick but they had to sedate her as the blood in her body literally changed. The goblins seemed to get along with Squalo for some reason (maybe because he had a similar interests in combat as them). Her hair had gotten straighter that's for sure and her eye colour had gone from brown to the same light grey that Squalo had.

When she saw herself in the mirror, she had freaked and started squealing (he honestly thought she would pass out) but what surprised him was the voluntary hug (one that did not involve Harry in the slightest) she gave Squalo

* * *

 **Lie no. 96:**

They had gone grocery shopping when the wizards showed up. Hermione had ran into the store and grabbed him, trying to pull him outside so she could apparate away. Saying he wasn't safe and that the death eaters could show up at anytime.

He was able to keep her focus on himself long enough for Squalo to situate himself in front of her. When she turned, she froze at the man in front of her pressing a gun to her stomach. "Let him go," he ordered. He removed the safety when she tried to reach for her wand. "Who do you think would be faster? You or me?"

* * *

 **Lie no. 97:**

His worst nightmares were coming to life and Harry was completely freaking out inside despite the calm facade he had put on. They had taken her outside into an alley and relieved her of her wand. Rosa was casually sitting on a box with her legs swinging, texting _someone_ (it better not be that Gokudera, he'd have an aneurysm if it was).

What was funniest in this entire situation was the fact that as Squalo walked away to call Xanxus for permission (cus the Varia don't just _kill_ people, they are actually more organised than that), Hermione had tried to appeal to Harry.

"Please, Harry, it's controlling you. Help me and we can get you away from him." she said. He merely smiled.

* * *

 **Truth no. 19:**

"I never liked you, y'know? You or the Weasley boy. You lied. It was in the way you acted and held yourselves every time you tried to convince me to be your friends. And, before you try to _win_ me over so that I can help you escape, let me just tell you that he _isn't_ controlling me. If anything, he protects me. So watch what you say about the people I love."

* * *

 **Lie no. 98:**

"Got it," Squalo said, ending the call. Pointing the gun at the girl, he said "Shitty witch," but before he could shoot, cracks appeared all around them. "Rosa!" Harry yelled as he grabbed Squalo. The young girl latched onto them before the wizards could get a clear view of what was happening and Harry apparated away.

They landed in their apartment and Harry began to run around in his panic, stuffing things into their bags before Squalo held his shoulders and said "Breathe,"

"Firstly, we can take them. Secondly, you can't keep running from them."  
"I've done it for eight years Squalo, I can do it for longer if need be,"  
"You are the Varia Cloud, you are quality even if you don't kill people. And for some reason Luss loves you and a determined Luss can get even Xanxus to do things."

"So what do I do?"  
"You stop freaking out, and take the fight to them."

* * *

 **Lie no. 99:**

He sent a patronus (born of his first memories with Squalo) to Ron Weasley telling him that he was willing to meet the order. Rosa refused to sit back and let them deal with it on their own (as per usual). So on the meeting date, she was sitting there at the cafe table. Everything was as prepared as it could be.

So when an aging Dumbledore walked up to their table wearing muggle clothing with Hermione and Ron and Ron's sister Ginevra, Harry gave a false smile. As they sat down, Squalo pointed his gun at the headmaster under the table. "It's a lovely day today, don't you think?" Harry said  
"Child, it's time to come home."  
"I mean, it's a bit too sunny for my taste but it's nice nonetheless." the cloud continued, ignoring the old man. Rosa giggled "I prefer storms. They're loud and stuff."

"That better not be you implying that you like Gokudera,"  
"Ew, no. We _barely_ tolerate each other."  
"Doesn't look that way to me…"  
"Stay out of this Squalo."

* * *

 **Lie no. 100:**

"Harry, you must return. You are our last hope."  
"Says who?"  
"There is a prophecy-"  
"Those things are self fulfilling half the time. But because I'm curious, I'l humour you. What is it?"

" _The one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord approaches ... Born to those who have thrice defied him, born as the seventh month dies ... And the Dark Lord will mark him as his equal, but he will have power the Dark Lord knows not…_ "

"Seventh month? Of which calendar?" Squalo asked.  
"What?" Hermione mumbled  
"Which? Calendar? Is it the lunar, Islamic, Christian, Norse? Viking calendar? Could be the Aztec calendar…" Squalo listed, Rosa giggled.  
"We get that you're deceptively smart, Squalo. You don't have to brag, you're already dating my brother."

* * *

 **Lie no. 101:**

"Harry, please come back. He doesn't really love you like I do. We could be the perfect couple," Ginevra cried. Harry and Rosa looked at each other before laughing whilst the assassin glared at the girl. Harry patted him on the shoulder and said "It's ok Squalo, I know you love me even if you don't say it much."

* * *

 **Lie no. 102:**

"Let's make a deal?"  
"What is it?"  
"We'll deal with Voldemort, you'll finally get off your ass and deal with aftermath. And we _never_ see each other _ever_ again."

"Harry-"  
"No. Deal or no deal. Either way, I will leave and never look back. Just be happy that I'm making sure Squalo doesn't kill you where you are. So, what will you choose? Will you take the deal or not?"  
"Very well, child."

" _Don't_ call me that. I was _never_ a child. _You_ of all people should know that, after all, you made sure of it."

* * *

 **AAAAAAAA~**

 **Harry fighting for what he believes in is nice. In this case Harry proves that despite not using magic as often as he used to, he is still good at what he does. Also, he's always secretly a big brother but after the TYL incident he's gone full blown paranoid big brother because he could always deny the fact that she would grow up but now that he's seen older Rosa, who's married and is stronger.**

 **This is gonna be fun, still need to update Fireworks, though so it may take a while.**

 **Enjoy!**


	15. 14th Set of Lies

**Lie no. 103:**

Dumbledore had brought his entire order to Harry's temporary flat (as if he owned the place, the nerve) and bless Rosa, the girl was getting revenge on his behalf by pretending he established a no magic policy that she enforced via an air horn she used next to people's ears. Her primary targets being Snape, the youngest two Weasley's and Dumbledore.

Again, bless Rosa.

* * *

 **Lie no. 104:**

"Oh my god, this boring!" Rosa exclaimed in the middle of a quiet lunch with the order.  
"Rosa?" he asked  
"Don't Rosa me! Just get the Varia, kill Voldermort, and let's go home, already! I _miss my friends_! And yes, I know! Even _I'm_ shocked I willingly called that bunch of weirdos my friends, but they're _my_ bunch of weirdos!"

"Oh look, another Potter obsessed with herself," Snape drawled.  
"Firstly, I'm not a Potter. I'm a Black-Superbi, ooo that sounds cool!" she began "And secondly, you are a self entitled arse! So really you're just the pot calling the kettle black!"

Following this, she pulled out her airhorn and let it loose in his face.

* * *

 **Lie no. 105:**

Belphegor was having such fun, the magicals were idiots that couldn't do _anything_ right, which made his job of killing the death eaters with Squalo all the more easier. He hadn't gotten involved with magicals since he left magical Prussia and even they weren't as dumb as the British wizards. But hey, Harry was Varia (even if his form of quality wasn't the same as the other officers) and Varia sticks together (even if saying that did make him sound like one of the vongola brats, and no one wants to sound like them).

* * *

 **Lie no. 106:**

"Hey, Xanxus?"  
"What do you want trash?"  
"Is it weird that I weighed myself to see how much it would cost to mail myself to Japan to get out of this hellhole?"  
"If it were any other place? Hell yes. This place? I'll ship you myself."  
"Sweet, I'll get the postage box."

* * *

 **Truth no. 20:**

"Xanxus! Why the _hell_ are you putting my sister in a box?!"  
"It's ok! I asked him to!"  
"That does _not_ make this better!"

* * *

 **Lie no. 107:**

"So, Horcruxes huh?" he asked the Order. "That's why the bastard is back?"  
"Watch your language!" Molly weasley scolded, as if he were still a child.  
"Yes, they found some of your blood from the Dursley home, luckily while the family was out so they weren't hurt, and used it to resurrect him with a horcrux."  
"More like unluckily…" he grumbled.

"From what I can tell there are six," Dumbledore told him "We must destroy them before we go after Voldemort."  
"Well, good thing with have Bel. It shouldn't take you too long, yes?"  
"Ushishishishi, leave it to me peasants."

* * *

 **Lie no. 108:**

The most difficult one wasn't the one hidden in gringotts, that was fairly easy to deal with. Talk to the goblins like people, tell them they were being deceived. And when that didn't work, the Varia snuck into the bank in a Helga Hufflepuff's Cup. 'In your face Gringotts bank' he couldn't help but grin.

No, the hardest horcrux to deal with was in fact Nagini. That demonic snake was a pain in his backside. It took them two hours to realise that sending Lilou to kill the thing wilse she was covered in basilisk venom would save them some sleep. The Lightning turtle returned after a few hours with wise eyes and an aged smile. He gave her the best lettuce he could find in thanks. Lilou might actually replace Squalo and Rosa as his favourite person (he was kidding of course, but the turtle was high up there on the list).

* * *

 **Truth no. 21:**

"Diary?"  
"Check."  
"Slytherin's locket?"  
"Check."  
"Hufflepuff's cup?"  
"Check."  
"Ravenclaw's Diadem?"  
"Check."  
"The demonic snake?"  
"Check."  
"Gaunt ring?"  
"Bel's doing the deed as we speak."  
"All that's left is me. Let's hope the goblin's aren't too mad about the break in?"

Oh? Did I not mention they found out Harry was a horcrux? Must have slipped my mind.

* * *

 **Truth no. 22:**

Yeah, the goblins were still mad. Thankfully, they had a healthy fear of Xanxus. But then again, _everyone_ should have a healthy fear of him.

* * *

 **Lie no. 109:**

Voldermort was seethed as he made his way around malfoy manor. His death eaters flinched at his every move, hoping he wouldn't throw an unforgivable at them. And if he did throw one, they just hoped it would be an imperio, at least that would allow for _some_ hope of survival.

"My lord, the _Potter_ has returned," Bellatrix said, practically spitting out the man's name as if it physically harmed her to acknowledge his presence "We can finally be rid of him."  
"Yes… soon, my loyal ones. Soon we will be free of him and the insufferable light."

Only to turn at the sound of a sarcastically slow clap.

* * *

 **Truth no. 23:**

Belphegor scuttled around the manor, hiding every footstep as he shuffled through the long shadows that covered the place. Unaware that Mammon had allowed the Varia members (who had come to accept the human lie detector that was their cloud officer) inside. And just as they walked into the main room, under the mist arcobaleno's flames. Only revealing themselves after Voldemort's vow, with every Varia member pointing a gun or knife at every death eater in the room. Belphegor had the special pleasure of using his knives and thread to steal Bellatrix Lestrange's wand, having prior knowledge of her Crucio-happy tendencies.

* * *

 **Lie no. 110:**

"Lovely speech, truly! It brought a tear to my eye!" Harry exclaimed a fake smile on his face.  
"Potter."  
"It's Black now. Being a Potter was too boring. 'Do what people expect', 'Be polite', 'Save everyone by killing Voldemort, even though they are perfectly capable of saving themselves'. Being a Black is much more fun."  
"Then why are you here, if not to kill me."  
"Oh, you _misunderstood_. That's adorable. I _am_ here to kill you, but not to save everyone. I am here to kill you because you're a thorn in my side. Call it being petty but, then again, I'm _pretty_ sure that is what Black's _excel_ at."

* * *

 **Truth no. 24:**

The smile didn't come off his face as he pulled his holly wand out of its place holding up his hair.

* * *

 **Truth no. 25:**

Squalo would never admit it, but the concealed fury and the bursts of magic he had never seen from Harry as he fought Voldemort one on one was as terrifying as it was arousing. Huh, seemed he had developed a healthy fear of the man. Then again, one shuold always have a healthy fear of a man that is a human lie detector.

* * *

 **Lie no. 111:**

See, the lovely thing about Squalo was that he knew what Harry was trying to say even if he didn't open his mouth. Case in point being when Voldemort was throwing an avada Kedavra at him that he was countering with an Expelliarmus and Squalo, the lovely assassin he was, stabbed him literally in the back before one of the death eaters could warn the dark lord.

* * *

 **Truth no. 25:**

Living up to his Black heritage (however distant it was biologically), Harry couldn't help but go up to the dying man's wand that had landed on the floor as he fell and snap it. Smiling, he whispered into Voldemort's ear:

"How does it feel to have been killed by a muggle?"

* * *

 **Truth no. 26:**

"Now in terms of a fee-" Harry began to the Order of the Phoenix  
"FEE?!" Ron, Hermione and Ginny exclaimed incredulously  
"Yes, a fee. Keep up or you'll seem stupid. Anyway, our general fee is 40,000 euros per death." Squalo told them, "But we'll be changing that just for you." A few of them sighed in relief, thinking the price was reduced. Only to turn pale as harry said:

"Yes, see, since a) I hate you, b) You were incredibly difficult to work with, c) the horcruxes and d) I _hate you,_ we will be multiplying that total by five to make it a lovely 200,000 instead. And the galeon to euros conversion is roughly 5 galeons to 1 euro when rounded up, so that would be a total of 1 million galeons.

Thank you for your patronage and for the record, if this total isn't payed in full by the new year we will hunt you down and kill you. Meaning you all have 6 months to gather the money or put your affairs in order. Your choice, really."

"Harry, my boy-"  
"Again I'm not your _anything_."  
"Harry, you saved us all should that not be enough. What need is there for a fee?"

"Honestly, I knew you were old should have guessed you were senile too-" he began  
"Harry Potter, watch your language"  
"For the _last time_ , I'm not a Potter anymore. I'm a Black. And there _is_ a need for the fee. Can't exactly do my job without being payed."  
"Job?" Hermione asked, confused.  
"Yes, job. Or did nobody tell you I work for the Varia?"

Hermione slowly turned pale. "The what?" Ron asked dumbly.  
"The Varia is an assassination organisation based in Italy. They are _mafia_."  
"Yes, and yet they are very good at what they do. I'd watch your back, keep your mouth shut and pay the fee. I've seen what happens to people who betray them. After all, I _am_ the one who spots those traitors."

* * *

 **Tada! The Voldemort arc is done, two chapters of self inflicted hell. To be honest, I didn't really like writing this. I did at first but then writer's block hit and I muddled my way through this. Hopefully, you enjoyed the Xanxus and Rosa interaction based that off 'Miranda', love that show. I'll try to focus more on Fireworks because I am really neglecting that for this and The Sisterhood. Back to Japan in the next chapter.**

 **Enjoy the chapter, prompts are welcome!**

 **Laetus**


	16. Epilogue: The Varia's Cloud

**Note: for some reason, I can't see certain line breaks no matter what I do, I don't know if this is just my computer of not but here's a notice just in case it isn't**

 **1st Secret:**

Everyone was wary of the new recruitment officer. The man was tiny, sure, and he obviously wasn't as physically strong as the other members of the Varia let alone the other officers, but he had the backing of their SIC (and interim boss) and the sun officer and that was enough to make sure they acted smart around him.

Nevertheless, it always looked as if he was staring deep into your soul when you spoke and _everyone_ knew about the Rabia incident. He was emotionless when he spoke to them, but a few had seen brief glimpses of warmth and joy when he spoke to the SIC and Lussuria.

* * *

 **2nd Secret:**

There were some who were dumb enough to cross him. He generally lived and let live, and didn't say much but there were some who got too loud. Too cocky. Too self-assured and had called him out. Didn't take long for them to disappear.

There were rumors that he used to bartend for a place in Palermo. Apparently most of the patrons were old school mafia too (non-flame mafia who apparently owed the guy), which would explain the frozen body parts they would find in the fridges around the Varia base (one guy found a finger in his packet of frozen fries. People are still wondering how he had done that considering the packed was still as sealed as the way he had bought it).

Then the evil little girl came.

* * *

 **3rd Secret:**

The Varia had long since accepted they would be tormented by the genius storm officer. Then they met the little girl that the recruitment officer referred to as a younger sister and they couldn't help but be glad that she wasn't a permanent fixture in their lives.

It was bad enough that they were stuck with Belphegor but this Rosa girl was evil. She would mess with their specialised equipment, rig their stuff to fail in the middle of a spar, she once made it look like someone had broken in and ransacked the place and had the blame placed on a guy who had _just_ returned from a mission and hadn't even met the Devil.

Unlike Belphegor, though, she got _away_ with it! The rain officer would just look at the carnage she wrought, sigh and walk off as she cackled. The only one that could keep her in line was obviously the new guy, but he'd just give this weird smile and let her just do as she wished.

It got bad enough that one guy had gone to the SIC and _begged_ for some modicum of peace. At that point, the rain just looked at the cloud and the cloud just looked at the little girl and said "I think they've had enough." She just grinned and shrugged. At least things relatively settled down after that.

After that, no one was dumb enough to cross the guy.

* * *

 **4th Secret:**

There were rumors in the Varia. Then again, there were always rumors going around the Varia. There was a betting pool for everything to be honest (all of which were run by Mammon for a price). You could even find a pool on 'will it rain fruit?' (they had weird mists).

But the most popular was: 'Is the rain officer sleeping with the recruitment officer?'

Everyone had _something_ to say about it. Ranging from 'no way' to 'the rain officer wouldn't settle' to 'probably yeah'.

No one had actively tried to figure it out, they had jobs. But a new recruit had gone in for his interview with the cloud and had been thoroughly, and metaphorically, ripped to shred by the man. He was sleeping with another recruit (apparently dilating eyes mean arousal?) and when he had tried to lie about it -which everyone already knew not to do, especially in front of the officer-, he had been even further hassled.

At the end the recruit stared at the man with a newfound respect for the Varia's lie detector. Especially when he gave an enigmatic smiled and told him "Don't worry, I was just giving you a hard time. There isn't any rules that says you can't have sex with another recruit or member. Honestly, if there was, I probably would have lost my job by now."

* * *

 **5th Secret:**

After that, the entire Varia was hit with a gossiping storm to figure out who the cloud was sleeping with (because a lot of people had _a lot_ of money riding on it being the Rain officer and they wanted to win).

Squalo just watched on as they hassled Rosa, who had just arrived on the compound from school, with Harry. Sighing, he looked over at him and asked "Did you have to feed them?"  
"Oh, come on, you know it's funny."  
"Still annoying."

* * *

 **6th Secret:**

A lot of people were very happy after that incident as Rosa, in a fit of rage, ended up spray painting 'YES, YOU ASSHOLES' onto the main wall in the compound.

The Varia were the unofficial record holders for fastest money exchange in 24hrs after that.

* * *

 **7th Secret:**

Since it wasn't really a secret anymore, it wasn't exactly rare for a Varia member to open the door to the SIC's office in the rain wing and see them making out. At one point Rosa had been with the poor member that had opened the door, and she looked up at the shell shocked assassin before giving an exasperated sigh.

"Not again," he had heard her mumble before she closed the door and threw a bottle at him (speaking of, he never figured out where she got that).

* * *

 **8th Secret:**

The Varia began to truly like their unofficial cloud officer after the Vongola Ninth decided to screw them over. He had tried to limit their movements again. He had stolen their boss from them for seven years, adding more and more restraints.

At first it wasn't that bad because the Eighth had protected them as much as she could as the old boss. But after her death two years prior(which shook them all, the entire Varia mourned the woman that had done her all to help them), the Ninth hadn't even waited a month before trying to add more and more limitations to the organisations. So much so, that a few had wondered if they were truly independent anymore.

But then the cloud, their blessed cloud had gone up to the interim and placed a paper on his desk. It was a contract. Mammon had gone through it with their usual fine toothed comb and summarised it for them.

"It allows us to disconnect from the Vongola. We get a set salary, and the money we get from kills will be considered extra commision. We'll get full autonomy. He's giving us an out."

It was then the Varia realised just how rich the cloud was and how much he cared (in his own weird way).

* * *

 **9th Secret:**

Their rain had obviously said no, which was a given considering how much their sky loved Vongola (even after the lies of the Ninth, the over reliance on the idiotic Sawada. But the pure Vongola that had lived within the Eighth boss and haunted them).

Their cloud wasn't surprised let alone bothered, he just gave his usual enigmatic smile and said that he knew that they would say no. "I just gave it to you as a threat against the Ninth if he gets to cocky. And even if you say no now, just remember it will always be an option."

Their cloud would protect them even in his own way.

* * *

 **10th Secret:**

He had always had their begrudging respect from the start for his skills, he had gained their interest in the betting pool, he gained a bit of their trust when he gave them an out but he gained their loyalty when he helped them get their Sky back.

Xanxus returned after another year. Rosa and their sky had insult matches that frequently resulted in glasses being thrown at the small girl, but the two of them got along well enough (which was a miracle in and of itself).

Their unofficial cloud became their official cloud officer after Xanxus returned and harmonised with him.

* * *

 **11th Secret:**

They always knew not to mess with him, but crushing Sawada was what certified it. The man hadn't just gone after him in terms of CEDEF but had gone after his marriage too (but then again, Sawada did that himself).

He didn't do anything by halves.

* * *

 **12th Secret:**

Xanxus's meeting with the Vongola heir had been put in place by Harry and Rosa for a few months after they had taken down his father.

The small heir was looking at the, technically, sixteen year old in an apprehensive way as he was flanked by Harry and Squalo. They had made a deal that day. When Tsuna became boss, he had long since accepted that it would happen by that point, he would go back on the limitations put in place by the Ninth. He would give the Varia their autonomy back. The brief joy in their faces was worth it.

* * *

 **13th Secret:**

Then an old bastard had gone after their Cloud. He _really_ messed with the wrong familigia.

* * *

 _ **Hey all! Sorry for the late update. I realised that I hadn't done enough on Harry's time in the Varia (outside of being Rosa's brother) and I hadn't explained how he got their respect, as seen in the previous set of lies. So here it is!**_

 ** _As you can see, Harry has sort of reverted to this enigmatic, confusing character from the loveable big brother we know in the more current chapters. This is mostly because, to others, Harry is this weird guy that makes no sense. The Varia and Rosa, and the Vongola, Luna and Clara know him personally after at least a year of knowing him. I think after a while, they do truly learn what Harry really is like._**

 ** _Time passes a lot in this one interlude so I'm gonna explain it now._**

 ** _1st year- Harry, Squalo and Rosa interact and get along and all that (lie 14 to 51). Rosa is 11_**

 ** _2nd year- Harry joins the Varia (lie 52 to 55 with 1st Secret to 10th Secret between_** ** _) and works with them. Rosa is 12._**

 ** _3rd year- Harry and the Varia save Xanxus and take down Iemitsu and everything after that before England arc (lie 56 to 89 with 11th secret and 12th secret) Rosa is 13_**

 ** _4th year- England Arc and everything after (lie 90+ and 13th Secret) Rosa will be 14 but not yet._**

 ** _Thank you all for the Favourites and Follows and Reviews! You all mean the world to me you kind people. I loved writing this. And I'm happy to leave it here as an epilogue. It was fun writing Harry and Squalo's relationship and their family dynamic. I hope to come back to this and do some much needed edits when I have time and I may occassionally come back to this and post something but I'm gonna end it here. So from here on out, this story is formally completed._**

 ** _Thank you for being with me to the end._**

 ** _Laetus._**


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